Is It Worth It To Get A Bloodwork To Check How Your Cats Are Doing On A Raw Diet?

[saleri]

Kind of curious to try a bloodwork test for my 10.5 month female kitten. I've done a lot of research and feed her a varied raw diet. But I'm still a bit worried due to her youth and curious what kind of test that would show.

The vet said there were two kinds I could ask for. A simpler one that included just kidney and liver, or a more complex youth one.

Thougts?

 

[KitCat93]

If you can afford it, it would not hurt. It'll give you insights into if she's missing something she needs or if you need to change her diet and how she's doing on her current diet .

 

[LTS3]

Keep in mind that many blood work reference ranges are based on pets who eat a commercial dry or canned diet. Pets who eat a raw diet may have slightly higher or lower levels than "normal". My raw fed IBD cat had an elevated BUN level last month. The vet thought it could be possible kidney issues. I did some reading and found that BUN levels are higher in raw fed cats because the raw diet has a higher protein content than dry or canned cat food.

General blood work is a good idea for any cat to get a baseline to compare to in the future

 

[saleri]

Keep in mind that many blood work reference ranges are based on pets who eat a commercial dry or canned diet. Pets who eat a raw diet may have slightly higher or lower levels than "normal". My raw fed IBD cat had an elevated BUN level last month. The vet thought it could be possible kidney issues. I did some reading and found that BUN levels are higher in raw fed cats because the raw diet has a higher protein content than dry or canned cat food.

General blood work is a good idea for any cat to get a baseline to compare to in the future

What kind of blood work should I ask for though? Cause it does seem like there are several different kinds?

 

[mschauer]

I assume you are interested in identifying nutrient deficiencies in what you are feeding???

I don't know that spending a lot of money on special tests will really tell you much. What would you even look for? There are dozens of nutrients that the diet you are feeding could be deficient in. Which ones would you look for? I guess you could pick a couple like taurine and b12 but what about all the others? It would be pretty expensive to test for everything.

Why Blood Work Can't Evaluate Pets' Nutritional Status | petMD
Nutritional Assessment for Dogs and Cats - Why It's So Important - IVC Journal

I don't know of any easy test that will give us a warm fuzzy that the diet we are feeding is OK. But, the only cases I've heard of when feeding a home-made diet to a cat of dog ended up causing nutritional deficiencies was when the person preparing the food did something obviously wrong, like not feeding kittens any calcium or feeding a liver only diet for years.

Edit: Doing some googling and found that excess phosphorous in the blood can be an indication of calcium deficiency. That might be interesting.

 

[coffeeharlot]

Having just done bloodwork for my raw fed cat, I can tell you that an extended CBC/Blood panel and urinalysis don't tell you a whole lot of anything specific as related to a raw diet. It will give you some numbers to keep as a baseline, which is always a good idea in case something does happen later down the road - like knowing their BUN levels are X, phosphorous levels Y, the protein present in their urine is such and such, so not likely kidney issues if that's the only result for a symptom of an illness. Things like kidney failure aren't normally a problem until cats get much older, but I've had a cat who developed CKD at 8, though he was fed a dry diet as well.
You can get them tested for various other things, like the taurine, b12, etc, but it's quite costly to get that specific.

In the end, it's up to you if you want to spend the money on it. A baseline is a good thing, but not absolutely necessary.

 

[riley1]

Having just done bloodwork for my raw fed cat, I can tell you that an extended CBC/Blood panel and urinalysis don't tell you a whole lot of anything specific as related to a raw diet. It will give you some numbers to keep as a baseline, which is always a good idea in case something does happen later down the road - like knowing their BUN levels are X, phosphorous levels Y, the protein present in their urine is such and such, so not likely kidney issues if that's the only result for a symptom of an illness. Things like kidney failure aren't normally a problem until cats get much older, but I've had a cat who developed CKD at 8, though he was fed a dry diet as well.
You can get them tested for various other things, like the taurine, b12, etc, but it's quite costly to get that specific.

In the end, it's up to you if you want to spend the money on it. A baseline is a good thing, but not absolutely necessary.

I assume you are interested in identifying nutrient deficiencies in what you are feeding???

I don't know that spending a lot of money on special tests will really tell you much. What would you even look for? There are dozens of nutrients that the diet you are feeding could be deficient in. Which ones would you look for? I guess you could pick a couple like taurine and b12 but what about all the others? It would be pretty expensive to test for everything.

Why Blood Work Can't Evaluate Pets' Nutritional Status | petMD
Symptoms of Nutritional Deficiencies in Cats
Nutritional Assessment for Dogs and Cats - Why It's So Important - IVC Journal

I don't know of any easy test that will give us a warm fuzzy that the diet we are feeding is OK. But, the only cases I've heard of when feeding a home-made diet to a cat of dog ended up causing nutritional deficiencies was when the person preparing the food did something obviously wrong, like not feeding kittens any calcium or feeding a liver only diet for years.

Edit: Doing some googling and found that excess phosphorous in the blood can be an indication of calcium deficiency. That might be interesting.

I just read the
Symptoms of carbohydrate deficiency in cats link.
This is silly! I have fed my cat Rad Cat for almost 4 years which has NO carbohydrates at all! She goes to the vet every year for a check up and has NO health problems. Her coat is thick and glossy, her eyes are bright and she has lots of energy.

 

[mschauer]

Where did you see anything about carbohydrate deficiency???

 

[riley1]

Where did you see anything about carbohydrate deficiency???

On your second link, go down to #4.

 

[mschauer]

Huh. That's odd. I don't even recognize that web site. It isn't the kind of web site I would normally reference. It looks like when the link I posted is clicked on a redirect occurs.
Thanks for the heads up!

 

[kittyluv387]

If you walk in with your raw fed cat and get a blood test you will walk out with a diagnosis of kidney disease. High protein diets that are species appropriate are not the norm so your cat's numbers will be off. I just take the advice to put him on renal food with a grain of salt and input some of his numbers into my spreadsheet. I consulted with a cat specialist veterinarian and she told me she doesn't think his slightly elevated numbers mean its kidney disease. She just advised to keep track of certain blood values.

 

[saleri]

This is an older post, but I did take my one year female cat that's being on raw for 6-8 months now for a teeth cleaning, and they took her blood work before hand.


Looked good enough, although I guess at her age it should be.

 

[daftcat75]

I would do the blood work, just the basic stuff, to establish a baseline. Go back in six months (unless kittens require more frequent wellness visits?) and do it again. Comparing the numbers over time is likely to tell you more about nutritional adequacy than comparing one-time numbers to reference ranges. But if something does go wrong between now and then, having a baseline may help you identify where things are going off.

Other than that, I would look at normal health markers like appetite, stools, body condition, coat quality, teeth, eyes, and ears. Except for teeth and ears (expect some resistance to inspections), this is something you can do daily without even making a big deal out of it. I can usually tell how Krista, my IBD cat, is feeling by the quality of her coat. A happy Krista has a luxurious well-groomed coat while a hairball-impending or nauseated Krista will have lost some shine and softness to her coat until the condition has passed.