Food for cats w/ chronic urinary crystals?

[applecrispy]

One of my cats has struvite urinary crystals. Last year he had a $3,000 surgery to remove a blockage and he was so miserable. The vet suggested Science Diet wet food but I really hate that brand. Is there anything else that is on the cheaper side but good for him? I currently feed him Nutromax wet food and he has a water fountain. I guess I'm just looking for suggestions on other brands of wet food to feed him that will help prevent new crystals/blockages from occurring. 

[MixedBerryJam]

We've had a really good response with Prescription Diet c/d. It's not cheap (a case of 24 is $40) but one of my cats was blocked earlier this year, but he's been (knock knock) crystal free on this diet. The worst part of feeding him this is that I have 3 cats and it's just not realistic to try to feed him separately and not risk him getting regular cat food, so I feed all three cats this stuff.

[applecrispy]

Nov 13, 2014 20:42:53 GMT -5 MixedBerryJam said:

We've had a really good response with Prescription Diet c/d. It's not cheap (a case of 24 is $40) but one of my cats was blocked earlier this year, but he's been (knock knock) crystal free on this diet. The worst part of feeding him this is that I have 3 cats and it's just not realistic to try to feed him separately and not risk him getting regular cat food, so I feed all three cats this stuff.

Is that the Hill's Prescription diet? I believe that's what they wanted to put him on at the vet's office. Do you get it from your vet's office or do you order it online? My vet said I could probably find it online cheaper. 

[MixedBerryJam]

Nov 14, 2014 9:33:59 GMT -5 applecrispy said:

Nov 13, 2014 20:42:53 GMT -5 MixedBerryJam said:

We've had a really good response with Prescription Diet c/d. It's not cheap (a case of 24 is $40) but one of my cats was blocked earlier this year, but he's been (knock knock) crystal free on this diet. The worst part of feeding him this is that I have 3 cats and it's just not realistic to try to feed him separately and not risk him getting regular cat food, so I feed all three cats this stuff.

Is that the Hill's Prescription diet? I believe that's what they wanted to put him on at the vet's office. Do you get it from your vet's office or do you order it online? My vet said I could probably find it online cheaper. 

I had to look at the can, but yes, Hills Prescription Diet. I've priced it out pretty much everywhere, and my vet's office, surprisingly, was by far the cheapest. I think they charge me $40/case. Places like Petsmart and ... whatever that other big pet store is, I'm blanking on the name ... don't seems to have a per-case discount. Even with free shipping with Amazon Prime it was cheaper at the vet. And actually, I had another cat years ago with the same issue and I could never get him to eat c/d. I really think he would have starved before he ate it, but these cats eat it just fine. It comes in two flavors, so I worry about the day they get bored!

[MixedBerryJam]

Oh, and did/will your cat have the p/k surgery? (It's a surgery that, erp, shortens the penis, thereby enlarging the external opening so there's less chance of blockage.) I have some experience with it if it comes up as an option. I won't go into gory details here, but if you have questions, pm me.

[lucky428]

We used this www.google.com/?gws_rd=ssl#q=royal+canin+urinary+so+feline&tbm=shop

It's expensive, but Science Diet is not a good option.

ETA Have you taken your cat to a specialist?  My cat had major kidney issues and we saw a nephrologist. She had crystals and he had quite a few ideas that were cheaper than the surgery your kitty had.

[mich1]

I had a cat that had repeated blockages every single time I took him off the Science Diet Prescription. After the second or third time, I realized that it was cheaper to keep him on the diet than pay vet bills. Fortunately, they never had to do surgery, they only had to catheterize him.

Since then, there are a lot more cat foods on the market that deal with this problem, but at the time I was having this problem, Science Diet was the only one available. Like the other person, since one cat got it, I had to feed it to both.

At the end, even feeding him treats was enough to cause problems, so neither cat got 'em anymore.

[applecrispy]

No, my cat hasn't had the p/k surgery. That hasn't been mentioned as an option yet. He just had surgery last year to remove a large blockage. We tried feeding him the special diet to break up the stone so it could pass but that didn't happen. I just don't want him to have to go through the surgery again. I'm all for preventive maintenance! I will look up the Royal Canin food. I looked at the ingredients on the Hill's one, they aren't the best. I will look up the Royal Canin food and add more water to his wet food and see if that helps. Thank you!

[katietornado]

Our vet put our cat on that Hill's food. He did really well on it, but we were committed to finding something better for him. He's always had bad teeth and been overweight, in addition to his urinary issues.

We started him on frozen raw food two or three years ago and the turnaround has been amazing. No more urinary issues and amazing teeth (he might just always be fat). We feed Primal frozen raw (chicken and salmon formula). Seriously...I can't recommend it highly enough!

[katietornado]

Nov 16, 2014 11:00:14 GMT -5 applecrispy said:

Nov 16, 2014 0:06:45 GMT -5 katietornado said:

Our vet put our cat on that Hill's food. He did really well on it, but we were committed to finding something better for him. He's always had bad teeth and been overweight, in addition to his urinary issues.

We started him on frozen raw food two or three years ago and the turnaround has been amazing. No more urinary issues and amazing teeth (he might just always be fat). We feed Primal frozen raw (chicken and salmon formula). Seriously...I can't recommend it highly enough!

We have 4 cats- the one who has the urinary issues is also overweight. We also have one cat with really horrible teeth. At one point we were considering doing a raw diet but I worried about the "raw"  part and if they could get E.coli or something similar if I didn't handle it properly. At this point we're willing to try anything.

So if it's frozen raw food do you just let it defrost every day or do you keep like a week's worth in the fridge and just give it to them each day? We feed our fat cat w/ the urinary issues in our half bathroom and close the door so the other cats have a chance to eat before he barrels in and eats their food. So we could even feed just him raw and the other three can continue to eat the regular canned food. 

Yes, we defrost a few days' worth of food at a time.  We have not had any food poisoning issues after 2 or 3 years.  We use metal bowls (not ceramic or plastic) and his dish gets washed frequently.

We have 3 cats.  The urinary issue one is too fat or uncoordinated to jump onto our kitchen counter.  We leave dry food out at all times for the other two on top of the fridge.  Fatty just eats his raw stuff on the floor.

It was kind of a last resort for us too.  He was doing really poorly for a while, and we decided to put him down.  We decided to give him an awesome last week, so we fed him raw and let him outside (into our fully fenced backyard that he cannot escape from).  His urinary issues turned around like we'd waved a magic wand.

[mcmel]

Nov 16, 2014 11:00:14 GMT -5 applecrispy said:

Nov 16, 2014 0:06:45 GMT -5 katietornado said:

Our vet put our cat on that Hill's food. He did really well on it, but we were committed to finding something better for him. He's always had bad teeth and been overweight, in addition to his urinary issues.

We started him on frozen raw food two or three years ago and the turnaround has been amazing. No more urinary issues and amazing teeth (he might just always be fat). We feed Primal frozen raw (chicken and salmon formula). Seriously...I can't recommend it highly enough!

We have 4 cats- the one who has the urinary issues is also overweight. We also have one cat with really horrible teeth. At one point we were considering doing a raw diet but I worried about the "raw"  part and if they could get E.coli or something similar if I didn't handle it properly. At this point we're willing to try anything.

So if it's frozen raw food do you just let it defrost every day or do you keep like a week's worth in the fridge and just give it to them each day? We feed our fat cat w/ the urinary issues in our half bathroom and close the door so the other cats have a chance to eat before he barrels in and eats their food. So we could even feed just him raw and the other three can continue to eat the regular canned food. 

We feed prey model raw to keep costs down and we've never experienced any illnesses from the pets or humans. Dogs and cats are designed to eat raw meat and handle it very well.