Cat lovers : experience with bladder infection?

He was back to normal when we picked him up, but the crystal might have been an indicator that his health was failing. I had to put him to sleep less than six months later due to advanced kidney failure.

Our cat Bandit had crystals. He ended up having surgery and then was on a prescription food to keep them from coming back. Was a very happy healthy kitty for many years after his surgery and we never had a recurrence of the crystals.

Hoping your boy will have a speedy recovery!

My kitty had kidney failure, and the vet thought it was either from a rapidly moving bladder infection or the tainted food that we all became aware of. I had fed a brand that was on the list of the tainted ones from China.

Nevertheless, I was able to keep her going for a few month with fluid treatments 3x a week. I hated having to do those fluid treatments, which consisted of inserting a good-sized needle in the tissue between her shoulder blades and filling her from an IV bag of solution hanging from a hook on the bathroom door. When I mentioned how difficult the process was for me. the vet's office offered to do them if I could get her in there every other day.

Good for you for getting your kitty in so quickly. My cat was 18 when this started, so she had lived a good long life. When I adopted the cats I have now, I bought a couple of those electric watering devices that my vet recommended. The sound of the litter waterfall attracts them and encourages them to drink more often. I also started feeding the highest quality of food I could find. They get Ziwi Peak wet food and Orijen dry food. I make my own dehydrated chicken treats for both the cats and my dog. I just didn't think about the dyes and crap in the diet of my previous cats. Now that I know better, I am very careful with their diets.

I'm so sorry this is happening to your sweet kitty. We had a few bladder infections with our dear Biru during his life and at the age of 16 he developed kidney disease. He lived another 2 years with this disease and passed away last December from a blood clot. I did a ton of research when he developed kidney disease and what I learned was that cats are designed (by nature) to not get enough moisture for their daily needs from water alone. It simply isn't possible. They must get some from their diet, and when they are out in the wild, or feral this is easily done by hunting mice and other creatures. When we bring them into our homes and feed them dry cat food 100% of the time (and I admit I did this because I didn't know any better) we set them up for failure-and eventually bladder and kidney problems. There is no way around it-it will happen. It's just a matter of time.

So the best advice nowadays that we know this is to feed our cats a wet diet of either canned food, or better yet a raw diet. After Biru (his name means blue in Thai, he was named that for his gorgeous blue eyes-he was a Siamese and of course Siam was the country that is now called Thailand)was diagnosed with kidney disease he needed a special food with a low ash content and he hated the prescription diet food recommended by the vet (plus I discovered they are very low quality), I spent 3 weeks literally searching the internet before I finally found a commercial food I could feed him. It's a website called www.felineinstincts.com What they offer is a powdered formula that I would order and then mix with raw ground turkey at home along with salmon oil to make Biru his own food, which would then give him a complete balanced nutritionally meal for an adult cat with kidney disease. They also offer one for regular cats and kittens. It took me literally 10 minutes to make up a batch that would last a week or more.

It was shocking to see the change in Biru. Within a week he gained weight-under the prescription food he lost even more weight, and yes we had to do those awful fluid treatments too with the needle and the bag. Within 2 weeks he got the sparkle back in his eyes, and his fur got fluffier. Within 3 weeks he was chasing his brother cat around the house. After a month we stopped the fluid treatment and never had to do it again. As I said due to this amazing diet Biru lived another 2 years, and if it wasn't for his chronic constipation due to a deformed spine (that he was born with) and for the blood clot he threw while being treated for that-I do believe he would have lived much longer.

If you go to the website you will see that the food is recommended for cats with bladder infections and other problems, and why. There is also a vet in a video that talks about the myths of raw diets and explains what the truths are. I wouldn't have believed it myself if I hadn't experienced it and seen it with my own eyes. The difference in my cat was like night and day. The costs? I think it was actually cheaper than the prescription diet and I bought the turkey at Whole Foods! Plus for the kidney diet we added canned pumpkin (it reduces nausea which kidney diseased cats have) so that added to my cost. I know in the future when I get a new kitten this is the food I will feed from now on. I look at it like this-feeding the best quality food means less visits to the vet and a happier, longer life for my cat.

I wish you the best of luck and am sending you hugs and well wishes for your dear kitty.

Debbie in MD.

We had a cat who was prone to urinary crystals, I'm so sorry. We have been told to give our cat wet food every day or two to keep him from having his same issue.
Kitty hugs.

My 13 year old male cat was blocked and $1700 later recovered. 3 months later we had to put him to sleep. Never had issues before that.

   No I didn't cook the turkey. The whole basis of this diet is that a raw diet is best for cats and dogs. If you go to the website you will see the video by the vet who explains why this is so. Some traditional vets still believe myths and think it's not. But they only receive one semester in vet school on animal nutrition and that is for all animals, horses, cats, birds and so on. Then Science Diet and Royal Canin contribute tons of money to the vet schools which is why you'll see these foods in almost every vet's office being sold as "prescription diets". It's basically a racket and sadly the traditional vets honestly don't know any better. When I did my 3 intense weeks of research I found out that Science diet and Royal Canin are actually very low quality foods. Will they help your pet survive? Yes possibly, but they cost a fortune and your pets will hate the taste. So getting them to eat it is a challenge. I had Biru on Royal Canin prescription food for kidney disease for 3 weeks and he lost even more weight on it.

One of the myths about raw meat being dangerous for cats is that it'll have bacteria in it, and they'll get sick. But the truth is cat's mouths are designed to battle this. Their mouths aren't like ours! Think about it like this. How did they ever survive for all of those thousands of years before we came along, made them into household pets and fed them this fabricated commercialized dry food? They killed mice and ate them raw, that's how. And they obviously survived doing this, right?

The video is really interesting, and explains it so much better that I can, and not only that but really explains the health benefits of this type of diet. Holistic vets and some traditional vets are starting to come around to this type of diet as it is catching on that raw food diets are the healthiest for our pets. My dear vet who I really love was so excited when he saw the change in Biru that I brought in the brochure from this company and showed it to him. He was so happy to see that it worked so well for Biru (basically the disease reversed itself) and decided to show it to all of his cat parents who had cats with kidney disease. They make a version for dogs too, but so far it's only for healthy dogs, because dogs don't get kidney disease like cat's do.

Debbie in MD.