hills w/d alternative for ibs?

[telnaga]

I adopted my cat Pretty Boy a few years ago, he's around 12 or so and has FIV, and a few little comorbidities of that, specifically really bad ibs (always diarrhea, can be really forceful and painful) and asthma (episodes of coughing and wheezing, occasionally hacking up phlegm. had no idea what it was, but saw a vid of a cat having an asthma attack, and that's exactly what he does.)

he drinks plenty of water. we feed him half wet food (tiny tiger from chewy) and half dry food (i honestly... dont remember what it is. but it's a really grain light formula.) the half and half is mostly to save money. we are pretty poor. I would feed both our cats just wet food if I could. hell, I'd make their food if I could. but i'm very limited by budget and energy.

took him in to a vet to see if I could help with his IBS because it seemed like it was hurting him more, and the asthma bc it was making it harder for him to play. the vet told me the treatment for both of those is the same! it's a gentler diet. he prescribed PB hills w/d (well, he had some i/d on hand that was donated, so I got it for free, and he said if that seemed to help I should switch to w/d after it was out.)

I'm pretty sure i've heard hills is kind of a scam that just pays vets to push it. and looking at the price tags to get more, and the ingredients list (the first two ingredients are grains? the second ingredient is corn? really?), im wanting to find alternatives.

so what exactly is in the diet that helps with ibs and asthma? and where can I get other kinds of food, wet and dry, that would do the same with less of the bs additives?

 

[lisahe]

If only it were that simple to feed a food like Hill's to a cat to take care of both IBD and asthma. I don't mean to sound cynical but, put bluntly, one of our cats has IBD, the other has asthma, and I wouldn't feed these Hill's foods (I looked at the dry food and the "multi-benefit" chicken canned food) to either of our cats. The IBD cat needs low carbs -- meaty foods without any grains and with minimal thickeners -- and the asthmatic cat needs about the same diet, plus an inhaler. Those are just our starting points: both cats need other medications and supplements.

 

[telnaga]

lisahe , that's what I was thinking - that the hills food doesn't seem all that much different from some cheap unhealthy food aside from the price.
do you have any specific low carb brands to recommend?

 

[lisahe]

lisahe , that's what I was thinking - that the hills food doesn't seem all that much different from some cheap unhealthy food aside from the price.
do you have any specific low carb brands to recommend?

Well, yes, the ingredients in the Hills food is far worse than, say, Tiny Tiger turkey pate. That's a pretty decent basic food with only one gum (guar, the least bad of the gums!) and no fish.
I feed that food to both our cats and have no big qualms about it. Except that the phosphorus is higher than I'd prefer to feed. All in all, though, that particular Tiny Tiger food is one of the "cleanest" we feed for our cats: it's basically just meat and all the vitamins and minerals a cat needs. Those "clean" and "basic" foods help cut inflammation, which can help ease cats' symptoms (particularly of IBD).

If a cat has IBD and asthma, there are lots of things it's best not to feed, particularly fish, beef, and carbs (potato, peas, tapioca, etc., etc.). You might want to start with "knock-offs" of Fancy Feast pates. There are lots of them out there. Just watch out for fish! I'm at kind of a loss as to what to recommend since there are so few foods that we can feed to both our cats. Rawz pates are very good but they're not cheap. Mouser's also good (and it's cheaper) but lots of cats are picky about them.

Dr. Elsey's Clean Protein chicken dry food works very well for both our cats. It's very calorie-dense, lower in carbs than many/most wet foods, and (apparently) delicious for the cats. Some people don't like that it has porcine plasma in it but I'd much rather feed that than, say, carrageenan, any gum other than guar, or any lentil, pea, or chunk of potato. I've found that I have to compromise a lot when I'm buying cat foods and Dr. Elsey's is okay. Dr. Elsey's will send samples if you ask. If you try it, introduce it slowly; some people seem to think that too much too fast isn't good.

I want to repeat, though, that unless the vet put your cat has very mild disease and said you could "watch and wait," asthma most likely will need to be treated with medications. Or (maybe) prevented if you hit on the right combination of things: sometimes replacing a dusty kitty litter can prevent asthma from progressing. Our cat went six years without coughing just because we changed her kitty litter! We currently use Tidy Cats Free & Clean Unscented. It works well for our cats but of course every cat is different. The big thing is to cut dust and not use litter with any fragrance. Getting rid of other scented stuff in the house (detergents, air fresheners, etc.) is also important, too. Smoke is also bad. I now clean our floors better than ever because dust can be a problem. We also got rid of dusty old furniture after Ireland was diagnosed. We also open all the windows for a few minutes each day, even when it's cold. That and many of these other things help my allergies, too!