The Six Ways You Will Help Your Cat Live Longer

Well, hey you guys, and welcome to The Longevity Vet. I'm glad you're here. Today we're going to talk about my 6-step cat longevity framework, or simply put, how to help your cat live their longest and best life. I'm Dr. Kevin Toman Toman. I've been a veterinarian for almost 40 years, and I'm a pet longevity specialist. So here we go. The first point in our cat longevity framework falls squarely into your lap. And that is your cat's diet. Now listen, I'm sure you've heard that every extra ounce of weight that your cat carries increases their risk for cancer, increases their arthritic pain, increases the risk of heart problems, increases the risk of kidney disease, and every one of those is true. So do what you can to keep your kitty as thin as possible, and you will have them around longer. However, I also want to make a point or two about diets themselves, and that is there's been an awful lot of talk in social media here recently about the perfect diet for cats, and spoiler alert, it just simply doesn't exist. But let me set your mind at ease. If you have an adult cat of good health, somebody that doesn't have any skin problems, no GI issues, no bladder problems, almost any national brand of cat food will work. Now, to be honest with you, I have some clear biases against Hill's products like Science Diet. I have some clear biases against Purina products, and I'll talk more about those in some video down the road. But the take-home message for you is that if you have a kitty in good health, you're in better shape than you, than you thought you were. One thing that is interesting to me as a longevity scientist, however, is that in dogs, There are a bunch of studies that show feeding home-cooked diets extend a dog's lifespan by up to 2.3 years over littermates that were fed kibbles. Those studies have never been done in cats, and I think there's ample room for us to learn about the value of home-cooked balanced diets for our cats over the next 10 years. So stick tight, because I think that'll be another way that you and I have of increasing longevity of our cats. Moving right along, pillar number 2 is minimizing your kitty's vaccines. Now listen, it may sound a little counterintuitive to listen to a veterinarian saying don't vaccinate your cat, but let me give you a little bit of context on this. The first thing I'm going to tell you is that you are absolutely right. Virtually every, every veterinarian has been trained to give your cat all the vaccines that they could possibly need on an annual basis. And I want to make one thing clear: if you have an outside kitty, one that goes outside and roughs it up with, with other outside cats, you darn sure better protect them against rabies. You better protect them against feline leukemia and the distemper complex that a schmo like me abbreviates as an FVRCP. But if you have an inside cat one that doesn't go outside or never sees another cat, these are the kitties that I question whether vaccines are really in their best interest, and here's why. Every time that you and I inject something into a cat, there is a very small chance that we are going to create fatal skin cancer at the site of that injection. Now listen, it doesn't happen very often, but I would tell you that over almost 40 years in veterinary practice, I know that I have killed at least 3 cats and probably more by trying to do what was right for them and vaccinating them. That is the reason, you guys, that your veterinarian vaccinates your kitty against rabies way, way down on their lower right hind leg and vaccinates your kitty against leukemia way, way down on their lower left hind leg, because that way we have an idea which vaccine your kitty reacted to to, and if they develop a tumor, we can amputate the leg and, and hopefully save your cat's life. But here's the question: is that really a fair trade-off if you and I are thinking about having to amputate a cat's leg to save their life for a vaccine risk that just simply does not exist? To me, no. The answer is clearly no. All right, moving right along to happier topics. Let's talk about dental disease, which is pillar number 3 on the list of ways to help your cat live their longest and best life. Here's one thing I want to tell you, and if you take nothing else from this video, please understand this: almost every cat over 7 is in periodontal pain. They have periodontal infections that are creating pain for them on a daily basis. And oh, by the way, these same periodontal infections are going to shorten their life by up to 15%, and that's a year or more for most cats. The only way, let me repeat that, the only way that we can solve that is with an anesthetic dental, and here's why. Because veterinarians like me have to take x-rays of every tooth in your kitty's body to assess its health and determine whether it needs treatment or whether it needs to be extracted, and there is no feasible way to do that without x-rays. I know it's an expense for you, but I also know that your cat could be in daily pain and having their life shortened by dental disease. So please talk to your veterinarian about this. The other thing that your veterinarian can really help— can do to help really extend your cat's life, this is pillar number 4, in the old cat longevity framework is this: they need to be testing your cat on an annual basis. Now, and I guess I would reframe that to say any cat older than 7 years of age should be having blood, blood pressure tests and urine tests taken on an annual basis. And let's talk about that in some detail here. The first thing I'll mention is blood pressure. I didn't stammer here just a minute ago, but Veterinarians hate taking blood pressure of cats because they're pain in the ass, but I will tell you this: just like you and I are prone to high blood pressure, and just like you and I, our high blood pressure can create heart problems and eye disease and kidney problems, the very same thing applies to our cats, and hardly any veterinarian takes blood pressures on cats on an annual basis. So please, make your veterinarian an exception to this. Tell them that you really want to have your cat's blood, blood pressure checked on an annual basis after they turn 7, and you will be heading heart problems and kidney disease off at the pass. The more routine tests that we run on the average adult cat over 7 are a complete blood count to look at how, whether they're dehydrated, how their bone marrow is doing, etc. And a chemistry panel to check organ function, in particular kidney disease. But I also want to emphasize the value of urinalysis, and here's why. I mentioned a little earlier that there's this nebulous link between your kitty's diet and their bladder health, and here it is. Depending on your cat's reaction to their diet— let me try that sentence again— what you feed your cat will create either more alkaline or more acidic urine in your cat. It's an individual thing. If you have 3 cats, they all might react differently to the very same diet. But we want your cat's urine to be as acidic as possible to prevent urinary tract infections and to prevent urinary tract bladders— urinary tract stones, excuse me. If your cat's urine is above 7.5 in pH, you are running the risk of increasing urinary tract infections, and especially if you have a male cat, the, the potential for them developing bladder stones is a life-threatening problem. Because if you've ever had to pee and been unable to do so for whatever reason, sitting around in church or whatever, you understand how uncomfortable it can be to have a full bladder. And what can happen with these male cats who are fed a diet that causes a high urinary pH they form little crystals, little microstones, and they try to pass them through their little small cat penises, and they simply gum up the works to the point where a cat can't pee. That is a very good way for you to spend $5,000, $6,000, $7,000 at an emergency clinic while your veterinarian tries to thread a catheter up your cat's penis in an effort to dislodge that, that blockage, or sometimes even have to amputate the cat's penis in effort to save their life. And so here's the moral to the story, guys: pay attention to your cat's urinary pH on an annual basis, and if it is consistently alkaline, if it's consistently over 7.0 urinary pH, please change your cat's diet or at least start your kitty on a urinary acidifier. There are a lot of powders that you can simply sprinkle over a kitty's diet to help their urine become more acidic. Okay, pillar number 5 in our cat longevity framework is the use of supplements for our cats. And listen, there aren't as many supplements that have been proven in cats as there are in dogs, but I can speak very directly to the benefits of 2. One is fish oil, our old standby friend, which has been proven to benefit both heart function kidney function, and for that matter, orthopedic problems. And the other is undenatured type 2 collagen for, to help keep a kitty's joints as healthy as possible. Now listen, for 20 years I sold glucosamine chondroitin products in my clinics. You know, the Dasiquins, the Cosequins of the world. But you know what? Over the last 5 years or so, there have been a bunch of studies saying they just simply don't work. Glucosamine and chondroitin products don't work for cats, they don't work for dogs, and they don't work for us humans. The thing that does work the very best to help our arthritic kitties maintain their joint comfort is a product called undenatured type 2 collagen. Now listen, we sell it as a product called Transcend, and sure, I'd love it if you bought it from us, but you can also find that in virtually any pharmacy, and so this is something that every cat, especially as they approach middle age, ought to be on. It's cheap, it's safe, and it's effective. Pillar number 6 when it comes to our cat longevity framework is the use of prescription longevity drugs like Rapamycin to help extend your cat's life. Why is Rapamycin such a player here? Because In every study to date, in every, in every mammal species studied, rapamycin has increased lifespan by up to 14% across the board. How does it do that? Well, first off, what's very important for us cat lovers is that it helps maintain normal heart function. And in fact, rapamycin is the only drug— let me repeat that— the only drug which has been proven to slow or stop the progression of fatal hypertrophic cardiomyopathy in our cats. The other things that Rapamycin does, however, are to reduce inflammation, so you're reducing joint pain when you use Rapamycin for your kitty. It's actively being studied right now for its benefits in chronic kidney disease because Rapamycin has been proven to help kidney disease in other species like us humans. And finally, Rapamycin also it reduces our old friend periodontal disease. So it improves kitty health by, by 4 different, in 4 different ways. Most veterinarians have no idea about the benefits of Rapamycin. So I'd like to conclude this by making you an offer. If these things resonate with you, if you want to do everything you can to help your cat live their longest and best life, well, I would love to work with I'm Dr. Kevin Toman. I run www.helpingpetslivelonger.com, and one of the things I do there is I offer longevity consults for dogs and cats. I can bring over almost 40 years of veterinary experience to your kitty to help them live their longest and best life, because there's nothing more important to me. We are all in this together, and I will help your kitty if I can. I'm Dr. Kevin Toman. Thanks for watching and have a great day.