Vitamin D toxicosis and hope for a happy ending
*Funds for blood tests, food tests/analysis, and a special diet for 33 cats for one month to help them detox*
Back on December 23rd our normally healthy, happy cats began to die. Some died with just a few hours warning, others wasted away over the course of weeks, improving just enough to give us hope of a recovery before a final crash. Two lovely girls died, but they were the exception; the victims have mostly been active, funny, cuddly boys who I adored. Most of the remaining 13 male cats are sick, and when all is said and done I think we'll be lucky to have 10 cats from our original 41. We've taken about 20 different cats to see 5 different veterinarians, and even though some of the diagnostics were helpful, no one could tell us why our healthy cats were suddenly dying.
Theories were bandied about, including blood parasites, FeLV, and obscure diseases of bobcats in Mississippi, but every test was negative. One vet claimed that the cats were dying from malnutrition because I made my own cat food, and she insisted I feed a commercial diet if I wanted the cats to survive. So, I abandoned the raw food after 5 happy years, and guilt-ridden I bought canned food at the store but the cats kept dying. Not only did the sickness continue, it got worse and worse, and I started to see a pattern: the cats always got sicker after eating canned food. I started to add some raw food back into the mix and even though it wasn't a miracle cure, I could really tell that the canned food was causing horrible problems. I even realized that the first death had come soon after I'd fed canned for the first time in months, so I assumed there was a grave manufacturing error and that the Internet would be awash with talk of recalls. But there was nothing. Finally a decent veterinarian took the time to necropsy two of the cats, and although she expected to see one cat with a shrivelled liver, she found a healthy liver and surprisingly, two shrivelled kidneys. The next cat was the same... his visible kidney damage was appalling, yet before he died his blood tests were normal. We looked back at every death, and although the symptoms were different, all could be attributed to a type of acute renal damage in the regions of the glomeruli and the renal tubules... basically, the cats were poisoned. The obvious causes, Easter Lilies and anti-freeze were ruled out immediately, but there were no other obvious toxins that could cause the symptoms we saw. It wasn't until I was reading old food recall information that vitamin D was mentioned, and the more I read, the more I realized we had an answer.
Our cats were exposed to levels of vitamin D that were either toxic to begin with or which accumulated in the tissues over the course of weeks until they reached a harmful level. Every can of food made them sicker, and the survivors only hope is to eat a diet completely free of vitamin D for at least a month so the toxic levels can start to disperse. Some of the sickest cats will still die because there's no way to stop the damage that's begun, but maybe some can be spared the horrible death of wasting away and starvation.
We need to help the cats who are still alive to rid their bodies of this toxin, and we need to test any food samples we can get from the affected time period to find out if vitamin D was present at poisonous levels. The AAFCO allowable upper limit for vitamin D supplementation could be toxic eventually if consumed every day, and it's possible that many healthy cats who suddenly die of kidney failure actually have vitamin D poisoning. Once our cats are healthy, I plan to start a website for vitamin D toxicosis awareness.
As for feeding the cats, I need to give them a diet free of added vitamin D, so I need to pay extra to buy organic chicken and eggs for the next month. Unfortunately, the poultry industry is trying to create products with high vitamin D levels to appeal to people, so I need to avoid factory-farmed products. Although this will be costly, it's far less expensive than more vet bills for dying cats.
I adore every cat in our care... some have been with us for nearly 10 years. I've had so many die in my arms lately.... Please help me guide them back to good health so that if I'm holding them in my arms, it's just to give them a happy hug.
*The canned food we used was Special Kitty and Friskies. I haven't tested the food yet and it may contain levels of vitamin D which are allowed by the AAFCO, but even acceptable levels can be toxic to sensitive cats, and vitamin D can build up to toxic levels over time as it has a half-life of 19 days or more.
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