Hi all,
Some of you might remember me posting on here a few weeks back about my cat Bertie's struvite crystal problems. It's taken a turn for the worse and I could really do with some more advice!
Bertie first became ill the week before Christmas, when I noticed blood in the litter tray and took him to first the emergency vet and then to our normal practice. Our vet confirmed from a sample of Bert's urine that he had struvite crystals and explained that a high alkaline level in the bladder causes the crystals to form. He prescribed Royal Cannin S/O urinary pouches and said these should bring Bertie's urine back within the acidic ph range.
The next time we visited on January 4, the vet expressed surprise that although everything else in Bertie's urine had returned to normal (glucose level, hydration level etc), his ph level had not altered at all and remained at 7.5. He said perhaps we just needed longer for Bertie to adjust to the new food and told me to bring him back on February 1.
So we went back with another urine sample last week, and the ph level has still not come down AT ALL! The vet is absolutely baffled - we ruled out the possibility of the sample being contaminated in some way, and I know for a fact that Bertie has eaten nothing except the prescription food since before Christmas. The vet says he has never known the food to NOT work before, and while Bertie's urine has such a high ph, the crystals will not dissolve and he is in permanent danger of a blocked/ ruptured bladder.
The vet told me to take Bertie home and continue to feed the prescription food, and that he would contact the food and drug companies to see if there was anything else Bertie could have, but he seemed quite defeatist and didn't seem to think there was anything that would work better than the Royal Canin food SHOULD have worked.
Sorry for the long post, but I'm really panicking about how on earth to bring Bertie's ph level down and get him out of danger. All ideas on why it remains so high, and/or how to reduce it, would be VERY gratefully received!