My Pet World: How to stop a dog from barking at the TV

Cathy M. Rosenthal, Tribune Content Agency on Mar 10, 2021

No, it won’t prevent kidney disease and is actually a poor diet for healthy cats, according to Deb Zoran, DVM, Professor, CVMBS Small Animal Clinical Sciences Department at Texas A&M. Zoran says, “A healthy cat needs a diet that is much higher in protein (greater than 40% protein if it is dry food or greater than 10% protein on the label of canned food). Because kidney diets are so low in protein (less than 26-28% protein), cats will start to lose their muscle mass because their body uses their own body muscle to replace what they need and which is not present in their diets.”

So please feed your cat a normal diet and wait to treat your cat for kidney failure should the time ever come.

Dear Cathy,

I don't understand what the story is with prescription cat food. We have two cats. Fiona has had no health problems whatsoever. Our other cat, Sally, had bladder stones, which we had surgically removed. Now our vet wants to prescribe this prescription cat food for Sally. Because we can't control which one eats what, he says it's OK for Fiona to eat the prescription cat food as well. If it's OK for our healthy Fiona to eat it, what is the need for prescription cat food? – Stephen, Long Beach, New York

Dear Stephen,

While it won’t hurt a cat to eat prescription food occasionally, it is not sufficient to maintain a healthy cat’s ongoing dietary needs. Prescription diets are meant to meet the medical needs of a sick animal and are not intended for healthy animals to eat. Prescription diets are expensive too, and it would get costly feeding two cats this diet when one cat doesn’t need it.

You can easily feed your cats different diets by halting free-feeding and feeding them in separate rooms twice a day. Another option is to purchase a microchip or collar-activated feeding dish that only opens for the cat with the corresponding microchip or collar. They can be worth the investment in a multi-cat home.

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(Cathy M. Rosenthal is a longtime animal advocate, author, columnist and pet expert who has more than 25 years in the animal welfare field. Send your pet questions, stories and tips to cathy@petpundit.com. Please include your name, city, and state. You can follow her @cathymrosenthal.)