Hi,
My 16 year old cat, Blur, was diagnosed this week with stage 2 kidney disease. I took him to the vet cause he was getting a bit thin.
I have found the information on this site to be a tremendous help and such great information.
Blur was also diagnosed with pancreatitis. The vet is focused on hydrating him and getting him to gain some weight back before doing anything else. She gave me pain pills for him for the pancreatitis, but I managed to get him to take 1 out of 4 over 2 days, so tomorrow I try a liquid! It is so hard to tell if he is even in any pain.
The vet suggested Sub-Q, 100ml daily for now. I said I would do it at home. He had one round at the vets office and one very successful one at home, but the last two days he has been like a leaky pincushion. I thought I had it figured out after talking to the vet today, but tonight same thing - ugh. I am going to take him to the vets tomorrow to go over it again.
Now to the food part -
I switched both my cats (I also have Spot who is 17) to Natural Balance dry and Merricks canned about a year ago, although Blur doesn't eat much dry food. I did this as a result of spending 4 1/2 years of trying to manage my Black Lab's seizures. After no help from the vet and bad reactions to prescriptions, I finally did the right research and realized I needed to change Naslund's food, and my cats too! On advise from the Natural pet store, I chose Natural Balance Limited Ingredient Diet food and his seizures went from every 4-6 weeks, to twice in the last year - both after he accidentally got into some food he shouldn't have!! End result - food allergies. Now he is almost weened off the harmful prescriptions that were actually causing liver damage and pacreatitis (that is a whole other story I am sure I should post elsewhere on this site).
Blur is a finicky eater at the best of times. Has never liked treats and as he has gotten older has been demanding canned more and eating less dry - maybe he is smarter than I thought!
The vet gave me some Royal Canin Recovery food to try to get Blur's weight up before the lab results came back, which he loved. Once the result came in she said a renal food like k/d would be better, but getting his weight up is important right now and he could stay on Recovery a little longer, so I have given a few cans of that. He has gained a bit of weight back (130 grams in the first 4 days).
I am not willing to put him on a steady vet food diet, so I dug through the cupboard for the Merricks (lower phos types), but he has been turning his nose up at it a bit, so today also bought some Wellness turkey, which he ate. I was thinking about RAW, but I don't want to change too much too fast, so I will go with this for now.
I will also lift his dishes up off the floor.
The vet suggested trying to feed him some Pepcid for nausea, but I think the pain pills are more important so I haven't even tried that. Has anyone else offered Pepcid to their cats for stomach upset and had good result?
Spot really likes her dry food, and currently has no health concerns, so I am hesitant to take it away from her and since Blur mostly isn't interest that is probably ok, but since he will eat it occasionally I would like to feed a lower phos dry food. Any suggestions? Yes I know I should try to get them off dry altogether, but for now it is baby steps
Thanks