fat content help

[kalypso]

Due to my cat being sick lately and vet suspected pancreatitis (she is currently on treatment and responds great), I have been researching cat food with respect to cat content.
So, I see that dr Pierson suggests moderate fat which is ~20-40% calories (https://catinfo.org/docs/CatFoodProteinFatCarbPhosphorusChart.pdf).
And then I look at % calories from fat in european wet food and most of them are too high!
For example if you see here: , granatapet which is considered one of the best available foods is 57% calories from fat! And mac's, which is the other brand I am feeding is 59.5%!
Why are these brands considered so good if they are so off the recommended fat levels? What would you suggest me to feed my cat?
I am really confused!

 

[StefanZ]

Yarrah(?) organic wet has really too little fat, but for you it would be good.

 

[kalypso]

Thanks for your reply StefanZ,
I looked Yarrah up, did the math and it is also high on fat, Yarrah pate bio chicken is 58,7% calories from fat.

 

[Azazel]

Most “high quality” canned wet foods are high in fat because it’s cheaper for manufacturers to use fatty pieces of meat than lean ones.

Do you guys have Weruva there? It’s a good one for high protein, moderate fat, and it has all of the values posted on its website.

 

[Columbine]

What about Thrive Complete? That seems to be the lowest fat cat food I can find. It's good ingredients too if you get the chicken-based ones. It is expensive though.

Edit: Just realised you're in Greece, and Zooplus.gr doesn't stock it

 

[kalypso]

thank you all for your replies!
I don't see weruva in European sites, however I do see thrive in petsexpert!
and it is indeed within limits, thrive complete chicken breast is 75,27% protein, 22,85% fat and 1,86% carb calories percentages!
This looks like a great choice, although I don't get the feeding recommendation "Feed 2/3 tins per day depending on your cat’s activity level.", if it is two thirds of a tin per day it is great, however if it is two to three tins per day then it is around 3 euros per day which is quite expensive. I emailed them asking.
But I am still buffled and disappointed, as I have read so many positive recommendations especially on granatapet. Omnomnom that also has great recommendations is also a high 58,28% calories from fat. I realize I need to never stop learning ...
Any other alternative choices are welcome!!

 

[Azazel]

thank you all for your replies!
I don't see weruva in European sites, however I do see thrive in petsexpert!
and it is indeed within limits, thrive complete chicken breast is 75,27% protein, 22,85% fat and 1,86% carb calories percentages!
This looks like a great choice, although I don't get the feeding recommendation "Feed 2/3 tins per day depending on your cat’s activity level.", if it is two thirds of a tin per day it is great, however if it is two to three tins per day then it is around 3 euros per day which is quite expensive. I emailed them asking.
But I am still buffled and disappointed, as I have read so many positive recommendations especially on granatapet. Omnomnom that also has great recommendations is also a high 58,28% calories from fat. I realize I need to never stop learning ...
Any other alternative choices are welcome!!

Glad that thrive will work for you. I’ve heard good things about it.

It’s the same with lots of high quality brands sold in America that lots of people love: Rawz, Feline Natural, Fromm, etc. Not saying they are bad foods, but they’re very high in fat.

 

[kalypso]

It is sad to realize this about fat.
It will definitely work but I will need a couple of (cheaper if possible) other ones to rotate.

 

[Columbine]

The Thrive cans are little, so it definitely is 2-3 full cans a day unfortunately. It is a very expensive food, but it's by far the lowest fat out of any complete foods I could find. The only other really low fat complete foods are:

• Hill's Prescription Diet Metabolic
• Royal Canin Veterinary Diet Obesity Management
• Concept For Life Light
• Purina Pro Plan Veterinary Diets Feline OM Obesity Management
• Purina Pro Plan Light
• Royal Canin Veterinary Diet Cat – Intestinal Moderate Calorie
• Royal Canin Veterinary Diet Cat - Urinary S/O Moderate Calorie

They're all between 2%-3% fat, but the ingredients aren't great. Maybe you'll have to accept sacrificing the best ingredients (at least some of the time) to get the low fat content your girl needs. It sucks that there aren't more pure meat lower fat options out there

 

[Azazel]

Just also wanted to point out that you should check the protein and carb values along with the fat when doing research. A food might be low in fat, but that might just be replaced with carbs, which is even less ideal than fat. Most of the so-called 'prescription' diets and weight management diets are very high in carb.

Also, you don't just want to go by the as fed values on the packaing. A food might be 'low' in fat on the pacaking (i.e., 2%), but fat is denser in calories, and so it may still be higher in fat than protein when considerd as a percentage of calories because fat will account for more of the calories than protein just by virtue of being more dense.

 

[Columbine]

K kalypso - What kind of diet does your vet (who has actually seen and is treating your kitty) suggest for her? I'd take my guidance regarding fat content from my own vet rather than Dr. Pierson (or any online vet in isolation). You can ask directly about fat content etc rather than an actual brand recommendation if you want to avoid prescription diets, or even show her a list of the brands and nutritional info that you'd prefer to feed and ask which of those would be best for your girl.

 

[mrsgreenjeens]

And since Weruva IS a good brand as far as high protein, low far content, and fairly inexpensive conpaired to Thrive, you might send them an email asking them if they are aware of anyone who sells in or ships to Greece. Worth a shot.

 

[Azazel]

Vets are not nutritionists and are not expected to understand the composition of food items. Most have no idea about the quality of brands of foods.

 

[Columbine]

Vets are not nutritionists and are not expected to understand the composition of food items. Most have no idea about the quality of brands of foods.

Whilst vets are not nutritionists, a vet should be able to tell you what fat level is appropriate for a pancreatitis kitty, and you can go from there. And any vet should be able to look at the nutritional analysis of a food and say whether it is suitable for a given illness. (For example, my vet suggested a specific supplement for my old FIC girl. I said I already had her on a different one. He looked it up, compared ingredients between the two brands, and said the one I was already using was a great choice.)

Whilst prescription diets aren't ideal in terms of ingredients, they are a good jumping off point in terms of things like fat content. For example, in this situation I might look up the nutritional analysis of a recommended prescription food, and look for other foods with a similar fat content.

It is worth noting that not everyone suggests a very low fat diet for pancreatitis cats (but it is necessary for pancreatitis dogs):

In dogs, feeding an ultra-low-fat diet is crucial for treatment success. In cats, a moderately fat-restricted diet is recommended.

From Pancreatitis in Small Animals - Digestive System - Veterinary Manual

 

[kalypso]

It is dissapointing to consider going back to royal canin and the like, when this is where I started from before switching to acana, orijen, bozita, and now granatapet and macs. I am not negative though, I am open to consider all choices.
Unfortunately, I have not come accross a vet who would get in to nutrintional analysis recommendations, but then again it could be that vets in greece are not informed about nutrition.
My current vet suggested royal canin stage 1 or digestive, on the grounds that he has 5 cats roughly my cat's age that are on royal canin and are healthy (his cats have dry food). So, the argument was not really based on specific nutritional recommendations. He also mentioned that a large percentage of cats in general get renal disease (not very promissing).
So I found this great excel that can search for food with specific nutrintional maximums and minimums Cat Food Database, however it is us foods. I search for min 50% protein, max 40% fat and max 10% carbs (and then sort them by phosphorus) and I get a lot of brands like weruva and tiki cat, but these are not available here. Out of brands like hills, rc and pro plan, only one rc and some pro plan fit the criteria. The list only lists wet food, but for example Hill's Prescription Diet Metabolic is 31% fat which is good, but it is 30% carbs which is way high.
By the way, do you know if fancy feast has a different brand name in Europe?
Then I took the uk food list from the felinediabetes forum (uk food with max 10% carbs): and used the typical values to calculate % of calories from protein, fat and carbs, and I get good values for some complementary food (cosma original, porta 21, miamor) and some complete food (gourmet gold savoury cake, felix as good as it looks, sainsbury's delicious recipes, blink!, purely holistic ocean selection and of course thrive complete). It seems I can get the complementary ones, as well as the gourmet, felix and thrive in greece. But still only thrive is both complete and quality food and I am only feeding wet so I need options for rotation.
And finally, I am not sure if max 40% fat is tight enough for a cat with a history of pancreatitis, and I have no idea where to ask.

 

[Columbine]

I think Fancy Feast is Gourmet Gold in Europe.

What about rotating the Thrive with the lowest fat out of the other higher quality foods? That might be a good compromise for now.

• Animonda vom Feinstein Neutered
• Animonda vom Feinstein Senior
• Catessy in jelly
• Granatapet Symphonie Chicken or Turkey&Salmon

These are all under 5% fat, and have high meat/low carbs. Catessey is the least 'good' in terms of ingredients (being by products) but it is still an all-meat food.

 

[kalypso]

Hello Columbine!
I use the recommendations of dr. Lisa, which are measured in percentage of calories: protein >50% calories, fat 20-40 % calories and carbs < 10% calories.
So, I have to take the typical analysis (or even the guaranteed analysis) and transform it to percentage of calories. To do this, I use this excel: If I put the analysis (from zooplus) of catessy in jelly in the excel, I get that 52% of calories come from fat, which is above the limit . So the analysis may be 4,5 % fat, but if you disregard water and consider the caloric content of ingredients, then you see that more than half of calories come from fat.
I don't claim the recommendations or calculation to be the right ones, but these are the ones I have found and use.

 

[Columbine]

Oh ok, I see I'm not mathematically minded enough to cope with that myself! Some of the other foods I mentioned are denser, so might work out at a slightly lower percentage using that method.

I was just thinking that you could maybe consider the diet as a whole, and that maybe a combination of Thrive and some of the slightly higher fat foods might still average out at being a low enough overall fat content. Do you see what I mean?

 

[kalypso]

Thats a good option, that could averege both fat and price

 

[Azazel]

Whilst vets are not nutritionists, a vet should be able to tell you what fat level is appropriate for a pancreatitis kitty, and you can go from there. And any vet should be able to look at the nutritional analysis of a food and say whether it is suitable for a given illness. (For example, my vet suggested a specific supplement for my old FIC girl. I said I already had her on a different one. He looked it up, compared ingredients between the two brands, and said the one I was already using was a great choice.)

Whilst prescription diets aren't ideal in terms of ingredients, they are a good jumping off point in terms of things like fat content. For example, in this situation I might look up the nutritional analysis of a recommended prescription food, and look for other foods with a similar fat content.

It is worth noting that not everyone suggests a very low fat diet for pancreatitis cats (but it is necessary for pancreatitis dogs):

From Pancreatitis in Small Animals - Digestive System - Veterinary Manual

While I agree that a vet should be able to provide advice on what kind of diet is suitable for pancreatitis, I’m not sure I have confidence in all vets recommending appropriate foods for cats in given situations. There are wonderful ones out there, for sure. And it sounds like yours is one of them. But, I’m always very cautious when vets recommend foods for any scenario because of bad experiences I have had that have taught me that many of them really don’t understand feline nutrition or how the composition of pet feed works.