I’ve got three cats with hyperthyroidism and the vet has suggested that instead of giving them pills (which got increasingly difficult) I start feeding them exclusively on a hill’s Y/D diet. It certainly seems to be working, they’re gaining weight and their coats look better than they did on the pills, but I don’t understand why it’s working. I thought it was because it contained less iodine than other foods, but my vet says that isn’t it and mentioned something about nutro genomics. Now, I don’t want to make a complete study of that field, but if someone here could explain how this works, especially for hyperthyroidism, I’d by mighty grateful.
Also my apologies if I’m not supposed to give a brand name, but I’m not aware of any other brand which produces a food with the same effects. If there are more of them out there I’d dearly love to know, because the Hill’s food is bloody expensive.
If you accept a tumbler blog about pet health that cites journal papers as evidence with every written article, Dr. Jean Dodds is for you. Really read it yourself. it is very interesting and completely answers your questions.
Basically, Nutrigenomics is the field of study that a more scientific nutritionist would use to find out how the foods we/pets eat interact with our genes and organs, in order to prevent or mitigate diseases/disorders. Like how eating properly can negate diabetes or drastically lower your chance for heart disease.
This field of study has shown that, as carnivores, cats/dogs do not properly utilize soy proteins as opposed to meat proteins. Unfortunately, pet food companies in their search for greater profits have been putting in greater quantities of cheap soy proteins into their foods. This is still approved by the American Association of Feed Control Officials (AAFCO) ((like animal’s FDA)), because they still only look at the raw numbers/amounts of amino acids and whatnot in a product to deem it “complete” or “healthy”. It has been found that soy adversely affects the thyroid, inhibits endocrine function, and can inhibit pancreatic enzymes necessary for protein digestion.
So a similar event would be if you went to the doctor and had high blood pressure, and she told you to stop eating so much salt, you did, and you blood pressure went down. Same thing, most pet foods have too much soy in them, and they screw up the thyroid, the vet showed you a food that has no soy, and your cat’s thyroid went back to normal levels.
The only way to know for sure if any remedy is working is by doing a blood workup every month or so. The thyroid hormones need to be at the right level and stay there for the cat to be free of all the effects of hyperthyroidism.
Hill’s claims the food helps control thyroid function by:
So there’s a little more going on there than just replacing soy with meat protein. It would be a good idea to have their blood tested every month or so for a while to make sure the hormone levels really are in the normal range. If not, giving them the medicine and keeping the new diet is always still possible.
Anecdotally, I had a hyperthyroid cat who lived to be 24 taking the medicine daily. He already ate a special thyroid formula food provided by the vet, but if I took him off the medicine his blood levels would go back out of whack quickly. I dissolved the pill in a syringe with water and gave it to him that way because he wasn’t happy about taking pills. After a while it was so routine for us both it only took about 30 seconds a day.
Our vet put our cat on that diet after doing a blood test. Now, the last time the vet prescribed a change in diet, we had a month to make the transition, so we were able to use up the old stuff as we phased out the old and phased in the new. For this last transition, we had 5 days and ended up with most of a bag of the older prescription stuff left over. 5-6 weeks later, the vet came for another checkup and blood draw (our vet makes house calls, roomie has MS and can’t put the cat in a carrier). She called a couple days later and told us Katie’s levels were now smack dab in the middle of the normal range. And she seems calmer now too.
Oh, when she came back for the checkup, we gave her what was left over of the old food (it was the Hill’s calming mix). There was at least 6.5 lbs left over, we couldn’t use it, and maybe she had another patient who could use it. Damned shame for it to go to waste, you know?
They certainly haven’t replaced soy with meat protein, since the main ingredients listed are vegetable proteins. Meat comes somewhere in fourth or fifth place. I’ll certainly have them tested again sometime soon, but even without the test they already seem to be doing quite well on the new diet.