Kidney Failure - holisitic options?

[plebayo]

My 11 year old cat is in the very early stages of kidney failure. His BUN is 34 and his CREA is 2.8.

My cat has food allergies so he eats a raw diet - quail, pheasant, guinea hen and some canned salmon mixed in. I always add water to his food and he really doesn't actually drink hardly any water on his own.

I thought about putting him on Azodyl but the capsules are not that small and I am not really attracted to the idea of pilling him twice a day right now. At the moment he is displaying no symptoms of having an issue. I put him out for a dental and decided to send out a panel so this was discovered this way.

I work in a traditional veterinary clinic, I'm just curious if there is anything I can do holistically to help him out? If he could eat k/d even though it's a terrible food ingredient wise I would probably feed it because I have seen it bring kidney values back into the normal ranges but that is just not an option for him. I mostly just want to keep him feeling well for as long as I can. I am not sure how he would handle sub-q fluids and I watch kidney cats waste away daily, so I am not sure when he really gets ill what kind of a route we will take.

We will recheck his values in a couple of months to see where things are headed.

Thanks for any advice anyone had to offer!

 

[foxxycat]

have they talked about sub fluids?

Wet food with water added are my two suggestions.

I have a prekidney kitty who has been getting her slurry for 2 years or so now-we feed fancy feast pate style and I add a can of hot water to it-mash with a fork for about a minute. She loves it. We have tried the fancier foods and she hates it. she was on fish for almost 13 years and finally she will eat chicken and turkey.

Sub fluids can be done at home. Most are done every other day or so.

 

[blacksakura6]

My angel Stripe was diagnosed the same way.  He went in for a dental abscess and they discovered that he had early renal failure.  They told me at the time that he would only live a year but he lived 3 1/2 years without any problems until the last month.  And he never received any fluids until the last two months of his life.

I don't know if this will help but I did have him on Azodyl.  I truly believe that it saved his life.  I gave him salmon oil every day as well. (He hated it but he was patient with me LOL)  I added a pinch of psyllium husk and water to his food every day.  I read an article from England that a Vet gave Pedialyte (plain only) to his patients and it helped. Vets here in America say that it does nothing.   But I gave him about 30-50mls dispersed throughout the day for 3+ years and he never needed any fluids and was always well hydrated.

I never put him on any prescription diets but I always made sure that his food was low in phosphorus.  The Vet was shocked that he lived without any problems as long as he did.  And the only reason that he became as ill towards the end is because he had a kidney infection that we could not resolve.

Also Tanya's Renal Board helped a lot :  http://www.felinecrf.org/index.htm

I hope this helps.  Definitely check out Tanya's board.  It has a lot of info that is invaluable.
 

 

[foxxycat]

I love Tanyas site. I found so much more info than I could get from my vet. you can spend days reading.  I found the page about vomiting and not eating so very helpful for my stubborn old girl Floey.

 

[missmimz]

If you're on facebook join the group Feline CRF. There are lots of suggestions over there for holistic options. 

https://www.facebook.com/groups/felinecrf/

 

[goholistic]

The Yahoo and Facebook feline crf groups may have more insight on some holistic options. I find that Tanya's forum is very knowledgeable in conventional treatments (however, the main site does have a page on holistic treatments: http://www.felinecrf.org/holistic_treatments.htm). I like to use a combination of both in treating CRF.

I generally like the suggestions on the Holisticat site (although it hasn't been updated in a few years), with the exception of stinging nettle. Tanya's site gives reasons not to give nettle in the link above.

http://www.holisticat.com/en/chronic-diseases/41-crf.html?showall=1&limitstart=

Vetri-Science makes a product for cats, which some people use, but I hear it's not the easiest to administer:

http://www.vetriscience.com/index.php?l=product_detail&p=900507060

My two senior cats are also early stage, so for right now I have them on a wet diet with water added and a water fountain (water is always reverse osmosis purified), omega-3 fish oil, oral B-complex, B12 injections, probiotics, etc. They do not need phosphorus or potassium management yet. I'm still researching other holistic options for the near future, but I go about it very carefully. I don't jump right into starting something because some holistic/natural treatments can interact with other treatments/medicines and also have their side effects and toxicity concerns if not dosed correctly.

 

[donutte]

Hey, I actually saw your post on the FB group...

I never really did anything holistic, but not against it either. I'm coming to the conclusion that a lot of the treatment is very common-sense type of stuff, with the focus being on keeping them hydrated and fed, while reducing phos intake.