Pole’s CKD – Roughly At Stage 2

I finally managed to collect some of Pole’s urine today. It happened just before subcut because Pole was too nervous and urine just shot out. I didn’t have a bottle with me, so I quickly got a syringe and tried to syringe as much as possible of the urine from the table. A lot of it was soaked into the cloth, though, so I squeezed out some of that into a bottle. The syringe didn’t quite work as there was too little to be syringed up.

We rushed the urine to the vet’s to get it tested. Initially, the clinic staff said the urine could not be used since it is already contaminated. But finally the vet said they will run the test and interpret the results accordingly.

The test shows NO proteinurea, which is good.  If there were contamination of bacteria, there would be proteinurea, but since there was none, we can rely on this result being accurate that Pole’s urine has no protein. This means there is no protein leakage.

Yay!

However, the urine specific gravity is 1.019, which is lower than 1.035. This means Pole’s kidneys aren’t as efficient in concentrating urine anymore. This was expected, based on her creatinine and urea levels.  However, Pole’s SDMA had been normal.

The above shows that we cannot simply rely on one single reading to diagnose kidney disease. Even though the SDMA is normal, based on her urine SG today, Pole’s CKD is classified as stage 2. Well, this isn’t totally surprising because Pole’s urine already looks quite clear and does not smell at all. It was not unexpected…

I also learnt from a CKD cat global Facebook group that there are too many false positives and false negatives from the SDMA test so in some other countries, the SDMA is no longer considered a reliable measure of kidney disease. And here we are, thinking that the SDMA is very accurate since it’s something newly available in our country.  Well, it isn’t.

Creatinine and urea elevated, no proteinurea, but urine SG is 1.019. Phosphate normal but in the higher end of normal. SDMA normal. Stage 2 CKD.

Indy’s creatinine and urea are in the normal range, but has borderline proteinurea. However, his urine SG is 1.036 (good!). SDMA normal. Stage 1 CKD.

Cow’s creatinine and urea are (surprisingly) low. However, his urine also looks clear, so we might get him tested next year.

Bunny’s creatinine and urea readings are improving now, with subcut. No proteinurea but urine SG was 1.016. Phosphate normal. SDMA nomal. CKD Stage 2.

Cleo’s creatinine and urea are slightly high. SDMA normal. Cannot get a urine sample to be tested but I suspect she must be at Stage 2 too because she urinates quite often.

From the above, the SDMA test is really quite unreliable.

I think maybe kidney disease runs in the Cow Clan genes? The only thing for us to do now is to slow down the progress of the disease if that’s possible.

Cubgrub has its CKD Chicken and everyone loves it, so that would be their staple diet.

Outside, Ginger’s urine (yes, he is still spraying but now targeting Heidi’s basket and her kitchen rack) is yellow and it stinks, so that’s really “good”. Ginger’s SDMA was once on the high side too, but his creatinine and urea readings were normal. Later, his SDMA went down (and we didn’t do anything to make it go down too). Again, it shows that the SDMA isn’t really reliable….

Heidi’s and Tabs’ urine also smell really strong, so that’s all good.

Heidi is old, 13 years or more, probably older than Cow, Bunny and Pole, and yet, her kidneys are in a better condition.

It must be a genetic issue then.

For humans, it was previously thought that lifestyle (environment, food, exercise, etc.) played a more important role than genetics in life expectancy, but now, more and more, it is found that genetics actually has a stronger influence than is previously thought.

So, if one has good genes, be thankful! That would be something we are born with and can do nothing to change. Only the lifestyle factor is within our control.

Source: https://myanimalcare.org/2019/12/14/poles-ckd-roughly-at-sta..

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