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CRF cat suddenly pooped outside the box
She's been on a new renal diet for 3-4 days, seems to like it, has been voiding correctly in the box - suddenly, poop on the mat in the kitchen!
The only time she has done something similar is when I changed her litter. There are no mats in the bathroom anymore as all the washing wore them out. Even then she didn't go in the kitchen. She doesn't even ever go, as in walk, in the kitchen. Her food and water is in the dining room and I literally never see her go in the kitchen for any reason, much less to poop. The mat suggests further that it was deliberate. She has a message but I don't have the poop decoder ring!
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Executive Assistant to the wonder-dog and super-cat :-) |
#2
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What is the renal diet that she's on?
Can you tell if her poop was unusually dry and hard? How is her hydration? Frequently when cats are constipated, they'll poop somewhere besides the litter box because a) they associate the box with pain, b) they try to poop in the box, but can't get it all the way out until later when they're somewhere else. Constipation would be my first guess in this situation.
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"To close your eyes will not ease another's pain." ~ Chinese Proverb “We must not refuse to see with our eyes what they must endure with their bodies.” ~ Gretchen Wyler |
#3
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Purina, which I know people will bash, but the info out there is outdated. They are current on the research that too little protein is bad and elevated it in their rx food. They are the ones who DO most of the research. It's also the lowest in phosphorous to be found.
Doing my own thing caused her levels to triple in 6 month, so im not deviating from what the vet (who is up on nutrition too) says anymore. Her last few poos looked a little dry, but it's hard to tell because she goes while I sleep so they have a chance to dry before I see them. She's had regular sized poo every day.
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Executive Assistant to the wonder-dog and super-cat :-) |
#4
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oh, and hydration is good.
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Executive Assistant to the wonder-dog and super-cat :-) |
#5
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Could be a touch of constipation due to the change in food upsetting the normal balance in her tummy.
Does she have just 1 litterbox? Was the box clean when she had to poop or had she peed in there already? A good rule of thumb for all kitties, and I think especially ones with compromised kidneys, is 1 box per cat plus 1. So if you have 1 cat you have 2 boxes, 2 cats you have 3 boxes. Because of the extra amount of water consumed and subsequently peed out often times my CRF girl will have used both her boxes or 1 twice while I'm at work, so if your girl had peed in the box already she might not have wanted to stand in it while attempted to poop.
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Avoid biting when a simple growl will do The Spirit Lives As Long As Someone Who Lives Remembers You - Navaho Saying |
#6
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"To close your eyes will not ease another's pain." ~ Chinese Proverb “We must not refuse to see with our eyes what they must endure with their bodies.” ~ Gretchen Wyler |
#7
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Yes - she likes the dry, but not the canned.
Good thoughts in your other post. I don't get though why constipation would cause pooping on the kitchen rug! She has never, in 18 years, pooped anywhere but her box (except for during thee 'litter war'). I really, really like 'world's best' and she must really, really like clay
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#8
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I know you're not going to want to hear what I have to say. Gonna say it anyway .
Are these the ingredients on the bag of food you have? (it's what Purina has on their website, so if what you have is different, let me know): Brewers rice, whole grain corn, corn gluten meal,soybean meal, animal fat preserved with mixedtocopherols (form of Vitamin E), animal digest, fish meal,....Notice there is no meat in this food. None. I'd love Purina to explain to me how this much rice, corn and soy is in any way beneficial to an obligate carnivore. The carbs in this food are a whopping 45% of calories! And the protein is all plant-based, which is a no-no for cats with renal insufficiency. You want quality protein, which means muscle meat. A cow might do fine on NF, a cat won't, whether they have CRF or not. If these truly are the ingredients in the bag of NF you bought, I guarantee it will cause constipation, and worse. At the very least, please please start giving your kitty subQ fluids. Although it would be better if she ate wet food, ANY wet food, if you're going to give her dry than she should absolutely be getting fluids.
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"To close your eyes will not ease another's pain." ~ Chinese Proverb “We must not refuse to see with our eyes what they must endure with their bodies.” ~ Gretchen Wyler |
#9
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Any wet food, regardless of phosphorous level?
No, I tried following the advice here and what I got was BUN levels tripled in 6 months. A cat at the end of her life - it doesn't really matter so much about some of those ingredients. She's not going to eat them long enough to matter. All that matters to me is lowest phosphorous levels, omegas, and vit. b, I think it is, and whatever the right balance is of other stuff. I'm giving this food a chance because the vet is quite insistent. It's got the lowest phosphorous, .38. I'll be able to see how she's doing in a month. Purina is the company that does all the research everyone uses - how could their food be the wrong one? I don't like the looks of the ingredients either, but I'm going by the advice of my vet right now. PS I don't buy it at her clinic b/c it's too far. That is not why she chose it. She said K/D is next in line and Royal Canin after that.
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#10
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meat protein produces nitrogenous waste products. That is why there is not much in there.
I didn't mean to be so harsh in my last post, and obviously I respect the posters here or I wouldn't be back with questions. But I think y'all need to be careful about telling people not to listen to their vets unless they are a vet or a cat nutritionist who has studied renal issues specifically.
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#11
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I still have some wellness cans. I can't find though the phos. count on those.
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Executive Assistant to the wonder-dog and super-cat :-) |
#12
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Absolutely! You can add phosphorus binders to the food. It's NOT about the protein. Cats need protein!!!!! At all stages of their life, but especially when their health isn't optimal, otherwise they start to catabolize their own muscle tissue. http://www.felineoutreach.org/Education/Kidney.html
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one of the poor quality prescription diets instead. Could very well have been an even faster decline. Quote:
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http://www.pets.ca/forum/showthread....ight=nutrition http://catnutrition.wordpress.com/20...food-and-vets/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/14708361 http://www.vetmed.ucdavis.edu/vmnews...ews22-1p07.pdf http://www.vetmed.ucdavis.edu/whatsn...e2.cfm?id=1375 http://www.mousabilities.com/nutrition/rebuttal.html Quote:
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"To close your eyes will not ease another's pain." ~ Chinese Proverb “We must not refuse to see with our eyes what they must endure with their bodies.” ~ Gretchen Wyler |
#13
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I don't see how it makes sense to give phosphorous and then binders. Everywhere I read says it's best to control with diet. There are downsides to binders, so that doesn't make sense.
The majority of links I am directed to for low phosphorous foods are out of date, it's pretty hard to find new info. Script diets have raised the protein back up, so that's not an argument against them anymore. At the least, people are continuing to scare people away from rx food saying the protein is too low when it is not anymore. I think the ingredients look like **** too. But I'm giving it a month - that is when her next check-up is. My vet did say if I can find a food with even less phosphorous, to feed that. So she is not stuck on the script foods, she just wants the lowest phosphorous.
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Executive Assistant to the wonder-dog and super-cat :-) Last edited by Mia101; March 28th, 2010 at 04:43 PM. |
#14
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Yes to a certain extent providing the ingredients are high quality including quality muscle meat, after that a phos binder is used.
What was the blood phosphorous level on the latest test? Did the vet do a urinalysis yet? Quote:
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Why is your vet so insistant on feed this food but leaving the far more medically important decision of fluid therapy up to you? Where did this info come from? Who said Purina is doing the research everyone uses? Quote:
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What downsides? These can be compensated for if the pros outweigh the cons The mint flavour can be overcome by using a generic tasteless/odourless binder. The calcium based binders can in some cases cause too much blood calcuim and may not be as effective as an aluminum binder, and aluminium toxicity is only a concern for human dialysis patients. I steer people away from the rx foods because of the ingredients as well as the well publicized toxic recall a couple of years ago. Where is the quality meat protein in NF? So what are the treatment protocols your vet had currently in place aside from eat low phos food?
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Avoid biting when a simple growl will do The Spirit Lives As Long As Someone Who Lives Remembers You - Navaho Saying |
#15
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What info do you have on these revised protein levels? And lets take a look again at the source of that protein. Poor quality grains. How is this good for a cat, designed to eat meat?
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"To close your eyes will not ease another's pain." ~ Chinese Proverb “We must not refuse to see with our eyes what they must endure with their bodies.” ~ Gretchen Wyler |
#16
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If you don't know the protein amount, how can you say it's not enough?
'Binders are used IF NECESSARY'. Doesn't make sense to MAKE it necessary by feeding too much phosphorous. I don't like the ingredients of NF anymore than y'all but I don't have the luxury of farting around about food right now. She's on the cusp of stage 4. I'm giving this a chance because my vet believes that the lowest phosphorous food is the priority right now. She is not dehydrated, so the issue of fluids has been put off until next month, when we check to see if the food is helping.
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#17
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I already said that meat (to my understanding) produces a waste material that Purina is wanting to avoid. better to get alternate protein sources than produce more waste the kidneys can't handle.
I do not think that an 18 year old cat with kidney disease is going to live long enough for that to matter much. Not to mention, there are tons of cats who live to ripe old ages eating plant based protein, so that shows they are adaptable like most creatures. Sorry but you guys go a little too far with the insistence on canned food at any cost and some other things. Research does not support that feeding high phosphorous foods and then using binders and then using things to mitigate binders is better than feeding low phosphorus dry. Especially with a good drinker. I'd like to see proof, not supposition, that cats cannot drink enough. I AM going to feed canned food that is low in phosphorous when I can find some that I know is and that she likes. I know Growler said some varieties of wellness are, but I can't find the post with the actual values. Our idea of what is low enough differs. Below .5 is what my research says. For 6 months I fed with 1.0 or slightly higher due to being told on here that is the target. Where did that come from? In my reading I found that 1.0 being alright is only if the cat will not eat anything below .5, and only in early stages. Again, unless you are a vet or a nutritionist who specializes in renal disease, I do not think you should state your opinions so forcefully based on internet research. It's misleading to people who come here knowing nothing and believe you because you are so emphatic and cite a couple of studies.
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#18
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protein 25%. moisture 11%
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Executive Assistant to the wonder-dog and super-cat :-) |
#19
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btw
I am not financially able to go to extreme measures to keep her alive, unfortunately.
The cost of food is fine, I'll eat cheaper foods myself before not getting what I think at the time is best for her. But all the extra bloodwork alone is going to make me go into debt. I can afford maybe twice to have IV's, but if it gets into all these meds and regular fluids, I'm simply going to run out of money and credit. I'm going to march on with whatever the vet suggests until I have only $100 to let her go humanely. I HATE that, but it's the sad, sad reality of being poor. I sacrifice quite a bit of things most consider necessities so that my two pets have premium food, every vet visit they need, the heartworm, other parasite, and flea protection, toys, bones, etc. and pet insurance on the dog. But there is a point where there is nothing left to give up.
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Executive Assistant to the wonder-dog and super-cat :-) |
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http://www.felinecrf.org/how_bad_is_...ow_bad_numbers I have found that most conventional vets are not pro-active enough with renal disease, instead opting the wait & see approach. Has your vet mentioned any of the Vetoquinol supplements? http://www.vetoquinolusa.com/pages/pro_renal.html Quote:
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As close to or below 1% dry matter was recommended by my previous conventional vet as most rx canned foods are around .5-1% dry matter phos. The 1% dm phos value is where the rx foods tend to top out at. Quote:
I would rather feed a slightly higher phos level food with quality ingredients than a lower phos food with lower quality ingredients. http://www.pets.ca/forum/showthread....203#post485203 Quote:
I have a CRF cat, I have been living with/researching this disease since April 2007. Before/at the time my grrl was eating a RC prescription vet food that was recalled due to toxic melamine that was confirmed by RC to have caused her CRF. My grrl has been raw fed since Dec 2007, she is on fluid therapy & renal support supplements and her numbers are better than your cats' are . My opinions are not just based on internet research I'm living it. dry matter protein of this dry food is 28% the minimum requirement for healthy adult cats is 26% http://maxshouse.com/nutrition/aafco...t_profiles.htm Good luck with your cat
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Avoid biting when a simple growl will do The Spirit Lives As Long As Someone Who Lives Remembers You - Navaho Saying |
#21
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Then there is no way that she isn't dehydrated, and you should be giving fluids if you're going to insist on feeding her a moisture-depleting dry diet. Quote:
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"To close your eyes will not ease another's pain." ~ Chinese Proverb “We must not refuse to see with our eyes what they must endure with their bodies.” ~ Gretchen Wyler |
#22
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I don't have an insistence on feeding dry. I spent months being a scientist figuring out canned foods she'd eat I'm only doing it while it's the only food I've got that is low enough in phos.
I've also explained that I've given alternate advice a try and I don't think it hurts to give the vet's idea one stinking month!
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Executive Assistant to the wonder-dog and super-cat :-) |
#23
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She's not NOT being pro-active. She is not in stage 4, and she wants to see if the food helps, and if it doesn't enough then fluids.
Not every cat is the same. Treating CRF is not a one size fits all approach. I know all the arguments for canned food - no need to repeat over and over. I know they eat meat - no need to repeat over and over. I also know they are adaptable and if plant protein produces less waste in the blood, then it makes sense to me to feed it to a CRF cat! Though I would not to a non CRF cat. I don't care if she eats more and wastes more in the litterbox, it's her kidney levels and overall health I care about. Since there are cats who lived their whole long live on foods like this I don't automatically think it's a crappy as you do. Obviously if after a month it hasn't helped her and/or she seems in poorer health in other ways I will make another change. But I would never forgive myself if I did not TRY what the vet says she has seen GOOD results from more often than any other food!
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Executive Assistant to the wonder-dog and super-cat :-) |
#24
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Mia, I don't think anyone is trying to badger you. You asked for input and other members tried to help. It's not out of the blue--growler, for instance, has been treating her CRF cat successfully for many months now.
You can choose to follow their advice or not, but I'm sure it was all given with only the best of intentions.
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"We are--each of us--dying; it's how we live in the meantime that makes the difference." "It's not what you gather, but what you scatter that tells what kind of life you have lived!" "Be kinder than necessary, for everyone you meet is fighting some kind of battle." |
#25
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Also the research on canned food does not say that dry causes dehydration. It is a THEORY that feeding dry MAY cause chronic slight dehydration and MAY be a factor in CRF. They'd need to do a 20 year study to conclude that, and it hasn't been done controlling for all other factors.
But y'all take that THEORY and use it to hammer people who feed dry. Once, I couldn't even get info on dry because everyone said if I feed dry I may as well just shoot her so what is the point? That's fanatical. That's crazy. Cats have been domesticated for many many generations and learned how to drink! Talking about them like they still are their ancient desert creatures is denying evolution. Now, I *do* get why CRF cats need canned, but I've explained why I'm not doing that for one month. Unless I find one that is below .5 on a dry matter basis.
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Executive Assistant to the wonder-dog and super-cat :-) |
#26
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It's dangerous for people to do a few months of research and tell people to ignore all other advice from pros in such an authoritative manner. Many people leave this board very fast because instead of help they get put down over things sometimes they weren't even asking about! Not everyone has the same view that pets are like children,for instance. I do, but many do not and it doesn't make them evil. Why not help them where they are instead of blowing them off if they don't do everything that is considered to be the most ideal?
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Executive Assistant to the wonder-dog and super-cat :-) |
#27
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Opinions differ, Mia. You'll find that wherever you go. But everyone makes their own choices. I'm sorry you feel the way you do, but they really are only trying to help.
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"We are--each of us--dying; it's how we live in the meantime that makes the difference." "It's not what you gather, but what you scatter that tells what kind of life you have lived!" "Be kinder than necessary, for everyone you meet is fighting some kind of battle." |
#28
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So I find it quite reasonable to simply TRY their way for a month and see what her check-up shows. Vets do not always know a lot about nutrition, true. But some do, and they know a lot of things that nutritionists don't, so I think a coordinated effort is best rather than throwing out everything a vet says. When one displays to me they don't know jack about nutrition (like the one who said low protein is good 'a thin cat is better than a dead cat') I ignore them. Mine knows that it's the kind of protein, not the amount, that is of more concern. The NF canned is too high if it's .78, but if she would eat it I would feed it. Your quote agreed with what I said - that below .5 is the actual target and around .1 is only advised if the cat will not eat any food below .5. So why do y'all always tell people 1.0 when you know the real target is below .5? It doesn't take much typing to explain 1.0 is only IF the cat will not eat the target amount. As I said, and I have not had the chance to re-research what is so crazy bad about phosphorous, but my vet is emphatic that lowest phosphorus trumps the moisture in cans and the better ingredients in a higher phosphorus food. I am not saying that is true, and if it is true for all cats (they are not cookie-cutter) I'm saying I'm going to TRY it for a month because if I keep listening to the internet and not the vet, and she continues to decline, I will hate myself for not giving it a CHANCE. What in the hell is so wrong about that? My God. This week she is eating NF, a little of her old dry, and wellness with a touch of fancy feast to make it taste better to ease the adjustment, and then she will eat NF for 3-4 weeks, and I will know one way or another what is best for THIS cat.
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Executive Assistant to the wonder-dog and super-cat :-) |
#29
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It just sends people away continuing to feed meow mix or old roy. It would be better to get them on a quality dry than not changing anything.
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Executive Assistant to the wonder-dog and super-cat :-) |
#30
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You know Mia101, your surly attitude has gone beyond merely annoying and is now insulting. I won't waste my time posting more links to you that you won't read or will continue to dismiss. You're going to believe what you want to believe, and that's fine. I do have a question for you though.
Why are "y'all" so reluctant to feed wet food? It isn't the money, apparently. I'm guessing it's laziness. Just like with the subQ fluids. Several months of subQs are going to cost you waaaaaay less than even one night of IV fluids at the vet. But whatever, your cat ain't "going to live long enough for that to matter much" anyway.
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"To close your eyes will not ease another's pain." ~ Chinese Proverb “We must not refuse to see with our eyes what they must endure with their bodies.” ~ Gretchen Wyler |
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