Hill's I/D or Medi-Cal Gastro... we have to switch...

OntarioSheltie said:
Sadie was on a Medical/Royal Canin food hypoallergenic food for her digestive issues and it cleared everything up. I'd definitely use Medical/Royal Canin again if I had to, even though the ingredients aren't impressive at first glance.

A friend of mine has a pug who's prone to pancreatitis and she's been feeding him Medical Gastro for a few years. He's done very well on it and really likes it.
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I'm leaning toward that one... but I'd like to also try the California Natural Chicken & Brown Rice as it's similar in igredients (even fewer actually) and the nutritional breakdown is similar as well. It's available at Tisol & Bosley's (not sure if you have those store in ON), which makes it a lot more convenient than a food I have to get from the vet (my vet is 45 mins away on the opposite side of town). If it doesn't work, then I'll definitely try the MediCal and hopefully find a vet in the area that doesn't gouge people price-wise.
 
Mikos_Mom said:
I'm leaning toward that one... but I'd like to also try the California Natural Chicken & Brown Rice as it's similar in igredients (even fewer actually) and the nutritional breakdown is similar as well.
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California Natural Chick/Rice is what I transitioned Pixie to years ago when she had colitis from months of the low residue diet and it worked very well for her. She ate that for two years.
 
Mikos_Mom said:
I'm leaning toward that one... but I'd like to also try the California Natural Chicken & Brown Rice as it's similar in igredients (even fewer actually) and the nutritional breakdown is similar as well. It's available at Tisol & Bosley's (not sure if you have those store in ON), which makes it a lot more convenient than a food I have to get from the vet (my vet is 45 mins away on the opposite side of town). If it doesn't work, then I'll definitely try the MediCal and hopefully find a vet in the area that doesn't gouge people price-wise.
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Wow I don't blame you! I wouldn't want to travel 45 minutes to get my dog's food either! At the most its a 20 min drive for me. Let us know how he does on his new food when you've chosen one!
 
OntarioSheltie said:
Wow I don't blame you! I wouldn't want to travel 45 minutes to get my dog's food either! At the most its a 20 min drive for me. Let us know how he does on his new food when you've chosen one!
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There are a gagillion vets closer than the one we go to.... We go to him because he comes highly recommended. He's a bit of a lunatic (VERY stange sense of humour... and sometimes difficult to communicate with)... but he'll never "upsell" you on an unnecessary treatment and his rates are the fairest in town. ---- The last time I had Miko there he examined him, wormed him and gave us 2 cans of the IAMS to try out and he didn't charge me a dime!!
 
Mikos_Mom said:
There are a gagillion vets closer than the one we go to.... We go to him because he comes highly recommended. He's a bit of a lunatic (VERY stange sense of humour... and sometimes difficult to communicate with)... but he'll never "upsell" you on an unnecessary treatment and his rates are the fairest in town. ---- The last time I had Miko there he examined him, wormed him and gave us 2 cans of the IAMS to try out and he didn't charge me a dime!!
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You may find you can't buy prescription food from a vet you don't take Miko too. I ran into that problem.
 
Mikos_Mom said:
There are a gagillion vets closer than the one we go to.... We go to him because he comes highly recommended. He's a bit of a lunatic (VERY stange sense of humour... and sometimes difficult to communicate with)... but he'll never "upsell" you on an unnecessary treatment and his rates are the fairest in town. ---- The last time I had Miko there he examined him, wormed him and gave us 2 cans of the IAMS to try out and he didn't charge me a dime!!
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You may want to call around in your area and see if any of them sell the vet foods you want to try. I personally would try that before going with a non prescription food.
 
Vash was on Hills I/D for a few weeks when he was blowing stuff out his backside and I wasn't sure why. My vet also gave me a box of purina probiotic powder to add to his food.

Now I can't be 100% sure what helped him more but we only had a few cans of the hills I/D after we finished those off I added the probiotic power to his standard food and mixed in a little water to make some gravy.

Over all I would say the hills I/D food helped stop the immediate problem my pup was having but I think the probiotic powder helped keep him from experiancing the same problem again dispite the fact I was feeding him things that caused it to occur.

That said, as I recall the Hills I/D food was just chicken and rice, everything else that was added was either vitamins or filler. I'd imagine you could do some chicken and rice at home, and add in some vitamins for a superior result. Though I'm no nutritionist.

California Natural is highly rated, and the wellness simple stuff is good but I wouldn't buy it canned (wellness canned food is packaged at plants that do the grocery store foods, and quite frankly all look like dog-food dispite their supposedly high quality ingrediants, I guess I just don't trust em)

Also consider probiotic powder to assist with Miko's digestive issues.
 
Mikos_Mom said:
As some of you may have read, our vet gave us a couple of cans of IAMS Vet Formula Low-Residue to try on Miko. It's discontinued, but he thought he had a case or so left. Well, it turns out he only had 5 cans left. So I've got those 5 cans, but now I need to start thinking about another food to switch to. I should start "blending" relatively soon. (a real bummer, seeing we only just determined that the IAMS was working for Miko) That means I need to switch to Medi-Cal Gastro or Hill Prescription i/d. I know that overall both foods are not known for being the greatest quality... but until his tummy issues are completely resolved, I think it's important that we stick with easily digestible and nutrient rich food.

Neither of the foods are very similar to the IAMS though. Here are the basic breakdowns and the first 6 ingredients of each one... Based on this, which food do you think I would have the best luck switching Miko to?

IAMS - protein 7%, fat 2.8%, fiber 1% ... chicken broth, chicken, whitefish, brewers rice, corn grits, chicken liver

HILL'S - protein 25%, fat 14.9%, fiber 1.0%... water, egg product, turkey, rice, ground wholegrain corn, pork liver

MEDI-CAL - protein 28.8%, fat 37.7%, fiber 1.4%... water, chicken liver, chicken, rice flour, cornmeal, cottage cheese

So the IAMS barely has anything in it! It's very low protein & fat... the other ones are MUCH higher! The MEDI-CAL ingredients sound more attractive, but the protein and fat are soooo much higher than what seems to be working at the moment.

What do you think? The choice is really up to me and I don't want to make it based on price. (the receptionist at the vet's office thought that was a good way to choose... siiiigh)
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I don't like the corn in either one of them, the corn is hard to digest.. but if it were me and I had to choose one of them, I would go with the Medi-Cal.

I know that vets sell Medi-Cal and Science Diet, but there must be something else available that has low protein, low fat, and better ingredients..

just my thoughts.
 
Well, I tried the California Natural... no go. We were back to loose stools and pooping in the kitchen in the middle of the night. :dead:

Sooooo... I gave in and gave the Medi-Cal Gastro a shot... it's working great. Almost immediately we were back to normal poops and better yet... none in the kitchen!! :biggrin2:

So, I guess we'll stick with this diet of homemade chicken & rice and Gastro for a while and keep our fingers crossed that one day we can switch him to raw.

Thanks for all of the suggestions everyone!
 
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