Saturday, October 10, 2009

Food Choices for Cats

March 29, 2010
Recently I ran across another good article on PetMD for food intolerance issues in cats, which you will find here.

October 9, 2009
For cat food intolerances I highly recommend that you read "Prevalence and Causes of Food Sensitivity in Cats with Chronic Pruritus, Vomiting or Diarrhea" as a starting point.  Another general paper for both cats and dogs is, "Diet and Skin Disease in Cats and Dogs" Then there is a paper that looks into digestive system type irritants called, "The nutritional management of gastrointestinal tract disorders in companion animals ". That one requires payment to see beyond the abstract.  There is a general outline for the paper, "Essentials of nutrition in dogs and cats with gastrointestinal disease " or you can order the full text through the British Veterinary Association.

One of the Pioneers who taught us about "gluten free" information was Dicke, whose paper is outlined in "GUT" showing that wheat, rye, and barley are the culprits. The grains involved in gluten sensitivity are also listed in the article "A Non-Human Primate Model for Gluten Sensitivity".   If you do a search through the paper you will find NO reference to corn at all........

If you are looking for intolerance caused by corn, that would more likely be another common allergen called "fructose" that can cause a couple of digestive issues. One problem is malabsorption, and the other is fructose intolerance. This is an important differentiation as your pet may also have other sensitivities to ingredients such as molasses that can be learned about in the article called, "Metabolic effects of dietary fructose". To clear up the misunderstanding, here, Dicke obviously understood that the term "gluten" was a misnomer when it comes to "corn gluten meal", and one has to dig a little further into the ingredient list to find the problem such as a listing of just "corn" or "corn syrop" or "fructose" in any form. As I have stated on other sites, "corn gluten meal" is in actual fact a corn protein.  The only possible connection I can make with corn gluten meal and an intolerant/allergic reaction would be if the milling process creating the corn gluten meal was defective and residue of fructose was still present.  I would only expect this in a poor quality, (cheap), product.  If I find science to suggest I am wrong in my beliefs, here, I will correct the information on this site.

One study that covers an ingredient I always look for in pet foods is "Diet and Large Intestinal Disease in Dogs and Cats".  What I look for is either beet pulp or rice bran as an ingredient in pet foods, and this article helps explain why I would do this.

Please post your food suggestions here under comments, and possibly the reason why it works in your situation over other foods. Thanks for taking the time.

1 comment:

Unknown said...

White cat, now 7, showed standard skin food allergy response when a kitten. Vet handed me a bag of Hill's Z/D. I asked for canned. Eukanuba Dermatosis LB (European version of IAMS canned allergy food). These are the only commercial foods she can tolerate although did feed IVD Duck & Green Peas for one meal a day for a while.

Did SpotOn blood test and showed allergy to poultry, barley, rice, green peas. Z/D & LB contain rice & barley. So much for the test.

Have tried just about everything else available where I live and she probably has allergies to thickeners & additives which aren't tested. Things like allergic to canned pumpkin but can eat home cooked.

Does very well on homemade diet based on beef, pork, & salmon.