Food for Cystitis/ struvite crystals

Katie Pottenger

Hi, I'm currently at the vet for the second day after having a blocked urethra unplugged yesterday. I have alot of struvite crystals. My family feeds me California Naturals Herring and Sweet Potato with different super premium wet foods mixed in. My vet (a feline specific vet!) wants to switch me to a crystal dissolving food, but they all seem to be filled with icky byproducts and gluten. Does anyone have any super premium food suggestions? Of course, if it's necessary my family will switch me to the icky foods, but they'd rather not if there's a better alternative. Thanks!

Krista Dahn

So sorry you've been dealing with the blockage, those are no fun and so painful. My Mommy too has been looking for a holistic/super quality food but so far no luck, my brother and I are on Science Diet S/D currently but we're only going to be eating it for a short time. My Mommy has found that the novel protein diets (fish/venison/etc) seem to make the pH in our urine too high and was adding a suppliment by Solid Gold called "berry balance" it has cranberry's and other things to lower the pH of urine so that crystals shouldn't be able to form. Best of luck to you and we all hope you feel better soon!

Karen Lee

Try a food that is low in phosphorus. Phosphorus can cause UTIs and blockages. Foods containing fish are usually high in phsophorus. Here's two links where you can find out the phoshorus content of many brands of food: http://www.geocities.com/jmpeerson/canfood.html http://www.geocities.com/jmpeerson/dryfood.html Eat fish based food once in awhile if you can. Plenty of water is important, too. Eating mostly canned food will help some since it contains something like 80% water. Premium food suggestions.... Try this Catster post for links to companies that make premium foods: http://www.catster.com/forums/thread.php?t=352294 I eat Nature's Variety. The ingredients in the canned food are very good. There are a few different dry foods but all are good.

AshPoGus

My mom was looking on the Wysong website for some other reason, but ran across this product of theirs (a food supplement): "Biotic pH-â„¢ is designed for cats or dogs needing assistance generating and maintaining an acidic urine to help prevent struvite crystal formation." Here's the link to that. and they also have a cat food called Uretic, which they say: "A food formulated for cats prone to urolithiasis, but also an excellent maintenance diet. Contains no excess minerals and helps maintain an acidic urine." Here's the link for that. I know nothing about this, but I believe Wysong is a good food. Maybe some others can comment about Wysong and these products.