Often cats are sensitive to a certain type of food ingredient. So, an antibody in their intestinal tracts responds, leading to food allergy. Among all other type of allergies, with a 10% ratio allergies caused by food are more prone to cats.
Food allergies affect male, neutered cats and also female ones. It is also a misconception connecting specific breed of cats to allergies caused by food. This condition can initially create symptoms for cats from four months young to eleven years old. But majority of food allergy cases occur between 3- 6 years in cats. These cats are also in connection with inhalant allergies.
The main difference between food intolerance and food allergy should be learned to correctly manage allergy in cats. Allergy caused by food are taken as true allergies revealing symptoms like itching and skin problems associated with feline and canine allergies. Incase diarrhea or vomiting happens without creating allergic responses, it means that it's only intolerance of food. Cat food intolerance is similar to a human having a stomach ache or diarrhea as a result of consuming spicy food or eating food that is fried. By utilizing foods food intolerance and allergies can be prevented. This doesn't offend the agents.
Many studies reveal that few ingredients of food are the main causes of allergies when compared to the rest. The main common causes in cats are dairy products, fish and beef. Many pet owners would have observed that the following ones are the main ingredients found in foods that are consumed by the cat. Even though few proteins are more antigenic, it still comes in similar forms. So, this reaction depends mostly on the quantity of exposure.
The symptoms of this allergy in cats are most likely the same to most kinds of allergies. But the major ones are excessive scratching, hair loss, military dermatitis and itchy skin. For pet owners it is difficult to distinguish cars that suffer from atopy or food allergy by physical signs. But, they must suspect food allergy if these symptoms begin to take place during winter or through out the year and the cats fail to respond to antihistamine or steroid treatment.
When you figure out the symptoms of different allergies in cats it is very simple to diagnose the allergy. Symptoms of food allergy are similar to that of bacterial, notoedric mange, hypersensitivity to intestinal parasites, seborrhea and yeast infections.
It is necessary to carry out food trials. Elimination and provocative testing diets could be done. One should feed the cat with foods that has carbohydrates, proteins for 11 - 12 weeks without any treats. A typical instance is potato and venison or potato and duck. These foods are commercially available in the market or could be homemade. Young and growing cats have special nutritional needs. Diets made at home containing a carbohydrate and a protein eliminating multivitamins and fatty acids could be fed for 12 weeks. Food trials for kitten are carried out by giving a commercially balanced diet. After few weeks, feed the cat with previous food that they once have consumed. In case the symptoms are shown then it's surely food allergy. Others perform blood testing which is not accurate when compared to trials (food).
Feed the cats with commercial diets from hill or Purina or homemade diets which makes treatment of allergy simple and easy.
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