Crystals In Cat Urine Diet

Cats that are routinely fed a diet of dry food are particularly at risk for struvite crystals.

Crystals in cat urine diet.

An underlying cause for the development of struvite crystals is that many cats are reluctant to drink water from bowls. Dry cat food provides very little moisture in their diet can make their urine too concentrated making it difficult for them to pass the crystals. Dealing with calcium oxalate crystals and stones can be a little more of a challenge. The detection of urinary crystals is not synonymous with kidney stones or the clinical signs associated with them nor is detection of urine crystals irrefutable evidence of a stone forming tendency but there is some association with an increased risk for kidney stones in animals that are.

This has been the major reason that special dry diets have such variable results with preventing urinary crystals and stones in cats. Struvite and calcium oxalate are the most common crystals but their formation can t often be pinned to one cause. Also any condition that changes your cat s urine ph such as kidney disease or long term medication use can cause crystals. They ve evolved over millennia to get most of their moisture from prey.

These diets only contain 10 water. The more concentrated the urine the more likely minerals can become crystals and eventually stones. The three standard crystals in cats are struvite oxalate and urate. Different types of crystals may develop if your cat isn t eating a proper complete and balanced diet.

Certain diets can cause urinary ph to rise and can be the cause of crystals forming. It mainly occurs due to lack of or inadequate moisture in cat food or lack of drinking water. Many believe that this is due to cats eating commercial foods that acidify the urine. Crystals in cats also known as feline crystalluria is a medical condition which involves the formation of crystals in the cat s urine.

These crystals which are microscopic in size tend to appear like fine sand and often occur as part of or because of other conditions. Cats should naturally have a very low acidic urinary ph and a ph over seven an alkaline ph can encourage certain types of crystals to form. It takes approximately two months to correct levels via dietary changes. The veterinarian may also place the cat on a diet aimed at correcting the cat s ph levels.

So how do you make a cat drink more water. Cats should be fed a diet that consists of both wet and dry food. These crystals form when there is more magnesium calcium phosphorus or protein in the urine that it can be dissolved. Interestingly these crystals used to be extremely rare but now account for roughly half of feline urinary crystals.

Dry foods are too high in some minerals and increase the risk of the cat developing crystals.