What is the best food for cats with urinary tract issues?

My cat gets frequent urinary tract infections and he is now on science diet w/d per his vet. I would like to find a food that is not made from by-products. I found some natural pet foods at Whole Foods but none of them are for cats with urinary tract problems and they don't provide information about the Ph or magnesium content on the label.


TIA!|||I hope you will take Zamare's advice seriously. Cats with urinary "histories" should NEVER eat dried food again. The carbohydrate in any dry food makes the cat urine alkaline and the prescription diet adds methionine to counteract that. Typical veterinary medicine by the food companies - just throw something else in the food to counteract the problems the food is creating. They do it with "hairball" food too.





Meat, meat, meat that is the proper diet for a cat and the moister the better.





Go to: http://www.littlebigcat.com and read Dr. Jean Hovfe's articles titled "Urinary Disorders in Cats", "Why Cats Need Canned Food", "What Cats Should Eat" etc.|||You go girl! Good for you.





I can't recommend a specific food, but I'm going to paste from my blog on this topic. I don't claim to be an expert, but hopefully it'll be of some use to you.





CATS AND URINARY ISSUES


This is not my area of expertise, but this has been my experience: As a kitten, Poppy developed both a weight problem and a UTI. My vet told me to start feeding her special food which he happily sold me *gulp*. Poppy refused to eat it. Back then I was less aware of how to get cats to eat new foods, so I just said the hell with it and bought Purina One's urinary health food, mixed with weight management. She ate that from then until she was 2 years old. She never had another UTI. Does this mean that this food is as good as the overpriced prescription food, or did I just get lucky? I don't know the answer, although I suspect the former statement is probably true.





For various reasons, I soon thereafter began researching cat nutrition. I learned about the benefits of wet food, and found that in many cases, that's all that's required to prevent future UTI's. Even the crappy brands like Friskies would be better than dry food!





I don't claim to be a vet, vet tech, vet student or anything like that. But I know how to research and examine results. I've read a bit on this topic which is how I've reached the conclusions I have.





At the very least, were I to have another cat with urinary problems, I'd sooner try them on a GOOD QUALITY canned food before shelling out the dough for a "prescription" dry food (or even their canned varieties). That's because I believe that good nutrition and species appropriate food is much more likely to keep a cat healthy than inferior ingredients which have been tweaked to change their chemical composition.





What should YOU do? If your vet recommends a prescription diet, I can safely recommend that at the very least you get the canned version of that food. That way your cat will get the extra hydration it needs. And don't feel bad about giving your cat this food - temporarily. It will do what it's designed to do, so you can be sure that your cat will do well while you do more research. And I would encourage you to do so. Don't take my word for it - read up on these things for yourself. Stabilize your cat with the prescription food while you look for something better. If canned food (or raw) alone is not helping enough, there are other supplements you could research. I have not done so, but I know that Wysong makes a supplement for urinary issues. "Biotic pH- is designed for cats or dogs needing assistance generating and maintaining an acidic urine to help prevent struvite crystal formulation."





I can't endorse this particular product, but know that it's out there. And if it is, there are sure to be others. Again, I would sooner feed good food, with a supplement such as this, than the crappy prescription foods.|||I don't know about food, but I have heard that those constantly flowing filtered cat waterers are really goot for that because cats will drink much more water|||The ingredients in WD are horrible.





Much better is to feed canned food that is high in protein and low in carbs. You do NOT need to feed a special food.|||I feed the natural foods, preservative free. Dont recommend Science Diet. Feed mostly canned food, not tuna or beef. I found that adding Xtra-C made by Halo for pets really does the trick. Just add it to his food at each feeding. Has been a miracle vitamin for my cats.|||Prescription Diet C/D Multicare is what we feed all our urinary kitties @ work. Mixing the canned and dry is helpful as well.