IBD, vitamin malabsorption, and B-12 shots

[samus]

I can get organic meat, but the meat at all the bio shops near me isn't very fresh. Maybe I'm spoiled by the grocery store in the US I went to that had full butcher counters where you can get a custom quantity of organic meat and nothing was ever more than a day or two old. I've already had a couple incidents of getting something (sausages) from an organic butcher and getting it home to cook and find out it's bad. Now I just go to the Turkish butcher because I can tell he gets a lot of turnover, but who knows where that meat's from in the first place.

My vet has only suggested I try a new diet. He mentioned Vet Concept, but I can't get any information on what the phosphorous content is (she also has CRF). (I emailed them and they told me to call, and my German isn't great and it's even worse on the phone.) I'll look into Entero-Chronic.

 

[denverwriter22]

I'm sorry your kitty is having so much trouble with IBD.  My kitty, Carmine, has also been diagnosed with IBD (he also has FLUTD, arthritis, and needs regular anal gland expression every three months).  

I have not tried a different diet with Carmine due to the fact that the vet and I feel it's best to keep him on his prescription urinary tract food.  However, I've heard some suggest that duck, rabbit, and venison are good choices for IBD kitties.  Maybe someone else can weigh in on this?  

For Carmine's IBD, we started with B12 injections and Prednisone.  It took a few months of adjusting his Prednisone dose before we got him to stop losing weight and stable.  We gave him B12 injections every month for a long time.  But he had to start with weekly and then bi-weekly injections to start the treatment process.  Once he was stable, we went to once a month injections.  Recently, he's doing so much better, so we've stopped the injections and are tappering him to the lowest Prednisone dose we can that will still keep his IBD in check.  

Something else that has also helped Carmine a lot is mixing a little pumpkin into his wet food everyday.  Carmine tends to get constipated rather than have runny stool, and this has helped him fight the constipation a lot.  

I would definitely ask your vet about the B12 injections and see what he/she thinks.  I think it is a pretty standard treatment for IBD, and I know it has helped many kitties.  I hope that your kitty starts to feel better soon.  It's so hard to watch our babies not feeling well. 

 

[jcat]

samus The woman who takes phone calls at Vet-Concept speaks English - she takes orders from the Netherlands, so she has to. You could also have your vet's office contact them about phosphorous contents. It's not listed on the cans.

denverwriter22 Mogli is on all sorts of "weird" proteins, but he has food allergies in addition to IBD, and we did an elimination diet. He gets rabbit or hare, reindeer, duck (a late addition, because he's allergic to chicken), as well as kangaroo, goat, horse and veal. The IBD cats at the shelter get rabbit, reindeer and kangaroo. That's all grain-free and single protein.

 

[jcat]

samus Found it! Pages 16 - 18 have the "Phosphor" content for the canned food (0.21% - 0.25%, depending on the meat):http://www.vet-concept.com/$WS/vet-...obile/futteranalyse/VET_Produktuebersicht.pdf

 

[samus]

Thanks @jcat! I actually called them today and the Cat Sana Pferd only has 0.16% phosphorous wet (so 0.7% of dry matter), which is perfect for kidney insufficiency. The other meats in the Cat Sana line (ostrich, buffalo) are higher. It's not low protein, but it sounds like low protein is only for end stage kidney failure anyway. Are all of your weird proteins from Vet Concept, or do you have other sources of high quality single protein food?

@denverwriter22, I was talking to someone on the site to figure out a low phosphorous recipe for my cat, and she mentioned that rabbit is actually a pretty high phosphorous meat so it wouldn't be good for her kidney issues. Trying to find good, novel protein diets for cats with kidney issues is hard (but if she likes eating this horse food I may have found a winner).

 

[jcat]

that you found something! You'll need a prescription from your vet for the Cat Sana; the office can fax it to them. Your vet could also order it for you.

The weird stuff Mogli eats is from Vet-Concept, but he can tolerate the veal from Catz Fine Food (most of which is single protein). Another single protein food you could check out is MAC's Sensitive, which is available in lamb or turkey. We didn't have any luck with the lamb, but Mogli is okay with the turkey if he only gets it about twice a month. Zooplus sells both those brands. Amazon also has Catz.

Some butcher shops sell horse. We have one that has it on Saturdays only, but you might have a bigger selection.

 

[samus]

Ooooh, when did Katz start making this?

http://www.catzfinefood.de/produkte/nassfutter-purrrr/

Too bad they don't have a real phosphorous analysis on any of their varieties (they all say the same 0.15-0.25%, and I know there must be differences between meat type).

 

[jcat]

That's a recent addition to their line - I recall reading about it some time this year. You can email Pets Nature and ask about the phosphorus or post about it on their forums.

 

[samus]

If anyone else is curious, I emailed, they said it varies depending on the starting material but is approximately 0.18%. The range they give is a "tolerance range" that the food will never exceed. They didn't have any idea of which flavors might be more likely to have higher/lower amounts. (which I find surprising, since not every meat has the same ratio of phosphorous... for example, when I was researching making my own food msschauer told me that rabbit tend to have higher phosphorous and I should stay away from it.)

I really wish Terra Faelis didn't put whey and bee pollen in their food, most flavors would be great low phosphorous single protein foods if not.

 

[jcat]

Thanks for posting the follow-up. The pork might be something Mogli could eat. He already gets the Vet-Concept kangaroo.

Terra faelis looked good till I saw the whey and another ingredient (I can't recall) that I know he can't eat.

 

[lisamarie12]

Very informative thread, thank you.

My five year Molly was diagnosed with severe IBD in Nov 2015. Weight loss, occasional vomiting and horribly loose stools along with a ravenous appetite, were the main symptoms.  Our vet put her on budesonide, 1 mg, three times a week as well as a probiotic added to her food, Wholistic Feline Digest. Molly eats mostly canned foods, rotating with Lotus Just Juicy turkey or pork stews, Weruva Steak Frites and NV Instinct rabbit occasionally.

The vet preferred budesonide as a steroid indicating that it was "easier on the kidneys". Molly's creatinine also was on the high end of normal, last vet visit and the vet thinks possibly beginning CKD. We need to retest for another CBC.

She was eating some Stella & Chewy's freeze dried, however, due to the ground bone and constipation issues in November, as well as the higher phosphorus in raw with bone, I have since discontinued raw with ground bone.

Fast forward to January, her stools are normal, zero vomiting, however, she hasn't gained any weight (and it looks like she's lost half a pound after weighing her recently).  Despite the probiotic and budesonide, she hasn't gained weight and she is still an eating machine - always hungry.  At one point in December, I started feeding her Instinct canned duck and that was a major mess in the kitty box, you can imagine. I thought I'd try SC's FD duck, duck goose only (before I realized about the ground bone) and also - her stools were a mess, horrible IBD flare-up odor. So she cannot eat any fatty meats, I have read that IBD cats generally do better on lower fat diets which I've found to be true, at least for my Molly.

She is allergic to chicken and lamb.

Anyway, I am wondering if B12 shots would help put some weight on her? Could it be that she still has inflammation which is preventing her from absorbing nutrients? Again, her stools are normal, no vomiting, etc. 

I have tried to get her to eat some Rad Cat, thinking that raw might help her to feel more sated than the canned food she's eating but she has not warmed up to it, despite my efforts.

 

[samus]

...
Anyway, I am wondering if B12 shots would help put some weight on her? Could it be that she still has inflammation which is preventing her from absorbing nutrients? Again, her stools are normal, no vomiting, etc. 

...

It's possible. The theory is, B12 is needed to help everything heal, but until the intestines are healed she's not really absorbing it from food. Has her thyroid been checked? Is she showing any signs of discomfort (like hunching over, especially after eating)?

That reminds me, I should probably give my cat another shot. She's on omeprazole now (to reduce stomach acidity), which inhibits B12 absorption.

 

[lisamarie12]

 
It's possible. The theory is, B12 is needed to help everything heal, but until the intestines are healed she's not really absorbing it from food. Has her thyroid been checked? Is she showing any signs of discomfort (like hunching over, especially after eating)?

That reminds me, I should probably give my cat another shot. She's on omeprazole now (to reduce stomach acidity), which inhibits B12 absorption.

Thank you Samus, I appreciate the feedback. Yes, Molly's T-4 was checked as part of the full CBC - and was normal.  I have actually found a lot of info these past few days re: B12 and IBD and will discuss with the vet next week as far as shots.

Interestingly, her stools have been normal for the past three weeks - great actually, no vomiting in over a month.  I'll have to mention this to the vet also as far as possibly adjusting the budesonide.

Despite the positive signs, she still eats ravenously and hasn't gained a single ounce, in fact it looks like she's lost a few ounces the past several weeks. So I guess that would indicate that her intestines still haven't healed even though other symptoms have subsided. 

This is all new to me. Our other cat Mikey, Molly's brother, was loosely diagnosed with IBD from another vet several years ago, however, he never had the extensive tests Molly did nor was his condition as severe as Molly's, hence maybe what he had was a food intolerance.

Does the stomach acidity your cat is experiencing decrease her appetite?  I hope she's managing okay.

Anyway, thank you.

 

[samus]

She was having appetite problems, not sure if they were from the stomach acidity or IBD inflammation or hating her food or what. But now that she's on prednisolone and omeprazole she's hungry all the time and she's slowly gaining weight. (yay no stabby backbone!)

There seems to be a really vague line between food intolerance and IBD. Digestive tracts are complicated!

I'm glad Molly's eating!! In some other threads, I saw that if steroids don't get the weight back on, mild chemo (leukeran) can help. Supposedly it doesn't affect cats too badly, you can find other people experiences on here somewhere. My steroid experience: Samus had two shots of dexamethasone, then switched to 5 mg prednisolone daily, and now I'm working on tapering from 2.5 mg to 1.25 mg daily. I think at her lowest weight she was a bit under 3 kg, now she's close to 3.5. She started having this IBD flare up around the same time as Molly (middle/end of Nov) coincidentally. And her creatinine is also very slightly high. (I have to get her blood rechecked soon.)

The vet also gave her a shot of B12 when I first brought her in, and I've been giving her more about every two to four weeks. (It was more often when she was having the not eating, diarrhea, vomiting, etc.) It could have been that, or the steroids, or any combination of things (swittching foods, acid reducers, whatever other stuff the vet injected her with...) that calmed the situation down.

 

[lisamarie12]

She was having appetite problems, not sure if they were from the stomach acidity or IBD inflammation or hating her food or what. But now that she's on prednisolone and omeprazole she's hungry all the time and she's slowly gaining weight. (yay no stabby backbone!)

There seems to be a really vague line between food intolerance and IBD. Digestive tracts are complicated!

I'm glad Molly's eating!! In some other threads, I saw that if steroids don't get the weight back on, mild chemo (leukeran) can help. Supposedly it doesn't affect cats too badly, you can find other people experiences on here somewhere. My steroid experience: Samus had two shots of dexamethasone, then switched to 5 mg prednisolone daily, and now I'm working on tapering from 2.5 mg to 1.25 mg daily. I think at her lowest weight she was a bit under 3 kg, now she's close to 3.5. She started having this IBD flare up around the same time as Molly (middle/end of Nov) coincidentally. And her creatinine is also very slightly high. (I have to get her blood rechecked soon.)

The vet also gave her a shot of B12 when I first brought her in, and I've been giving her more about every two to four weeks. (It was more often when she was having the not eating, diarrhea, vomiting, etc.) It could have been that, or the steroids, or any combination of things (swittching foods, acid reducers, whatever other stuff the vet injected her with...) that calmed the situation down.

I'm glad your kitty has put on weight.   I don't know that Molly has lymphoma so asking the vet to prescribe leukeran, even if I wanted to, I'd be referred to specialist anyway. But thanks for the feedback, much appreciated, especially re: the B12 which I hope to discuss with the vet this week.

 

[nschipper]

Vitality Science sent me a list of commercial wet canned cat foods that they recommend as well as companies that sell raw food too. Raw food is a last resort for me because of the prep time involved. My cat is thankfully doing very well on the new canned food mixed with Vitality Science products too. They advised me to stay away from "birds" ... chicken, turkey, etc. because they belief most IBS/IBD cats have developed allergies to them. They (like the above post advised) suggested I stick to canned wet beef, venison, lamb, rabbit, and fishes ... Mr. Vegus likes everything but beef. And they want me to also avoid all dry foods and wets as well that have grains, wheat, and soy in them which the most common (and cheapest) cat foods that are sold in most grocery stores do have. INSTINCT brand cat food is what the owner of Vitality Science (Stephen Becker?) feeds his cat and fortunantly there is a Pet Smart near me that carries it too so that is why I went with INSTINCT wet cat food. They sell "birds" but I am taking Vitality Science's advice and staying away from birds too. I expect the above poster's experience might eventually be mine as well but for now it's a wonderful relief to see Mr. Vegus eating and keeping all his food down and gaining weight too. Good luck to you.

 

[catmom203]

I'm already broke from taking her to multiple vets and getting the blood tests done that told me she has CRF. (The second vet basically just redid the test the first vet did, even though I brought up being concerned about vitamin deficiencies and liver/pancreas issues.) One of the sites on B-12 supplementation in IBD cats was saying that a cat's serum B-12 level can be normal even while it's low/deficient in the spinal fluid and other areas, so I don't think I'll stress her out by taking her to a vet again soon.

I have been thinking of finding a better probiotic for her, though. (I feed her Fortiflora intermittently.) Which one are you using, and did you see any changes from using it?

I saw that your baby also has CKD. For CKD methylcobalamin may be safer than cynocobalamin. You can get it from Stokes compounding pharmacy in NJ with a Rx. 1000mcg per ml is a kitty dose.