Feline UTI's - advice welcome!

[kenobi65]

Hijinks...just how much does your cat eat??

Kola's pretty big (17 pounds), and a 4-pound bag of food lasts him a month or so. My wife just bought a 4-pound bag of Hill's c/d from the vet, which was like $13.

Only things I can think of...
1) Your cat is huge.
2) You're giving him the canned stuff.
3) Your vet is taking a serious markup on the stuff.

 

[Umbran]

I am not a veterinarian. My wife is. So stuff off the top of my head is only "well-informed layman", but given time to refer to her, I can get it right

First off, if and when you have questions call your vet. There is no veterinarian in the country worth their salt that'll get upset at you for calling and making sure you get things right.

Putting the pills in food is... unlikely to get the job done. You may be tempted to crush up the pill and try mixing it into food - Don't do this! If your cat doesn't eat the whole dish, you then don't know how much medicine they've actually gotten.

Your veterinarian should be quite willing to teach you how to give a pill to your animal. I can understand not doing so while you're animal is there freaking out - so go back without your animal and get a lesson!

If your animal is still highly resistant at home, and you cannot give the pills by hand without fear of getting bitten, they sell "pill guns" that can keep your fingers safer.

Generally, tap water should not be an issue. Ask your vet, but as I recall, crystals and stones are a result of pH imbalance, not mineral content.

Prescription food is pricey, but it is cheaper than repeated UTIs or surgery to remove bladder stones. I am not sure what the canned food goes for, but that price would be really high for dry food.

 

[Hijinks]

just how much does your cat eat??

My cat is approx. 10 pounds. Until now, he has always had as much dry food available as he wanted (I used to give him 9 Lives Urinary Tract Care dry food) in a self-feeder. Once a day, I gave him one forkful of Fancy Feast. That was it. Sometimes if my finicky girl kitty didn't want her Fancy Feast, he would eat hers also. Both of my cats have done fine on this diet until now.

At the vet yesterday, they said, "He's a big boy, so give him half a can twice a day." This is a LOT of food, in my opinion, and I don't think he needs that much. But if I were going by what they said to do, that would be 1 can a day, and they charged me $1.14 per can. So 30 cans = $34.20 per month. The bag of dry that they gave me was $12. It's not very big. My cats like dry food, so I was assuming two bags of that per month = $24. $34.20 + + 24 = $58.20.

I was going to try to give him half a can a day. So that way I would only have to buy 15 cans a month, which = $17.10. Total for the month would then be $41.10.

I tried giving him some of the canned and dry last night and he wouldn't touch it. I think he ate Boo's Fancy Feast instead. I've replaced the food in the self-feeder with the Hill's dry mixed with a little of the 9 Lives so that they get into the Hill's gradually.

He is doing much better today. He was crabby last night and obviously still sore. His sister wants nothing to do with him since he still smells like the vet; I wiped him down with a chamomile cat bathing wipe and she seems better. But he peed last night just fine. I think he thought I was nuts, praising him for peeing

He took the pill like a champ! Zeph held him and I put it in his throat and he swallowed it as nice as you please. Not a wriggle. We'll see how he acts tomorrow when he's on to us

 

[Umbran]

At the vet yesterday, they said, "He's a big boy, so give him half a can twice a day." This is a LOT of food, in my opinion, and I don't think he needs that much.

Well, the devil can be in the details - the volume of food doesn't tell you how much it really is, in a dietary sense. Take a check on the caloric content (from the Hills website)...

Hills Adult Original dry cat food (ye old basic Hills crunchies): 493 kcal/cup
Hills Feline c/d (the basic prescription stuff for uti): 309 kcal/cup

So, the c/d has a *much* lower calorie content. To maintain a 10 lb cat's weight, you want maybe half a cup a day of standard dry food, while on the c/d you want more like 3/4 to 1 cup.

Hills suggests 1.3 to 1.75 of their 5.5 oz cans a day to maintain weight on a 10 lb cat. So, if I have my math right, you'd want about one can of c/d, and then something on the order of a third of a cup of dry c/d.

My cats like dry food, so I was assuming two bags of that per month = $24. $34.20 + + 24 = $58.20.

If he's eating an entire can of c/d, he won't be eating all that much dry.

I was going to try to give him half a can a day.

If he's eating half a can, then he needs approximately (if my math is right)... half a cup of dry a day to maintain weight. At that rate, a single pound of dry food will last him 11 days. A four pound bag would do you for about a month and a half for one cat.

All, of course, modulo your cat's personal metabolism, habits, etc.

By the way, note that the stuff usually becomes notably more economical with a larger bag. The vet starts you with a small bag, because new foods are always a test. If he does take to eating it, buy in bigger bags in the future, and you'll save money. We don't bother buying in anything smaller than a 10lb bag.

I tried giving him some of the canned and dry last night and he wouldn't touch it. I think he ate Boo's Fancy Feast instead. I've replaced the food in the self-feeder with the Hill's dry mixed with a little of the 9 Lives so that they get into the Hill's gradually.

Ask your vet, but this is a common tactic. Hill's says, "With your veterinarian’s approval, mix increasing amounts of your pet’s new food with decreasing amounts of the old food over a 7-day period."

He took the pill like a champ! Zeph held him and I put it in his throat and he swallowed it as nice as you please. Not a wriggle. We'll see how he acts tomorrow when he's on to us

Good luck to you! I hope he continues to take it without fuss.

 

[kenobi65]

It sounds like part of the issue is that Hijinks has two cats, and as they're "self-feeders" (i.e., they graze througout the day, rather than eating at particular mealtimes), Hijinks needs to give both cats the same food. So, poor Boo (who doesn't have piddle problems) has to eat the more expensive food, too.

 

[Hijinks]

Yes, I figured it'd be much easier to give them the same dry food, but I'm going to try to continue giving her the Fancy Feast. She's very finicky and I doubt she'd eat the canned Hill's.

I absolutely refuse to feed the cats in the mornings with canned food because she will try to wake me up before it's time to get up, since she's a big drama queen and is always starving (she says). I like my sleep quite a whole lot, and I cannot hang with cats sticking whiskers in my face at 5 am. So they get fed when I get home from work.

 

[Umbran]

So, poor Boo (who doesn't have piddle problems) has to eat the more expensive food, too.

Yes. All the more reason to have a more accurate idea of what each cat will need. She she seems to have been overestimating her dry food needs by quite a bit.

I absolutely refuse to feed the cats in the mornings with canned food because she will try to wake me up before it's time to get up, since she's a big drama queen and is always starving (she says).

Oi, yes. We've got a cat who is very food-motivated. And his brother goes along because he likes attention. They'll often start meowing for food a couple of hours before feeding time. So sure as anything feeding time isn't in the morning

 

[kenobi65]

Oi, yes. We've got a cat who is very food-motivated. And his brother goes along because he likes attention. They'll often start meowing for food a couple of hours before feeding time. So sure as anything feeding time isn't in the morning

Yeah, Kola's the same way. He was a stray, and thus, he'll always eat what he's given immediately upon getting it (no grazing during the day for him). We feed him, and the dog, twice a day -- when we first get up in the morning, and at dinnertime. While the dog couldn't care less when she eats (she's never been motivated by food), Kola is frequently pestering us hours before feeding time (really annoying when he decides he's hungry at 4am, and is standing on my head to let me know that).

He really didn't like the prescription food when we first gave it to him...as mentioned, we mixed his old food in with the new stuff, and he'd actually pick around the kibbles of the new stuff. After a few days, he either (a) got hungry enough, or (b) got used to the new stuff, and now he eats it right up.

 

[Dingleberry]

I've had to give my cat a pill once a week for three years: sometimes it goes down easy, sometimes it's a prolonged battle. Hiding it in a treat worked a few times, then he got wise - and now he won't eat ANY treats.

My usual method is to grab him by the scruff to hold his head up and steady, put the pill on the tip of my index finger, pry open his mouth from the sides with my thumb and middle finger, pop the pill into the back of his throat, and then hold his mouth shut and stroke his throat until he swallows it. It usually helps to do it while he's napping: if I'm fast enough and get it in there the first try, he doesn't have time to react.