Vitamin D: an aid in recovery for cats?

A link between vitamin D and recovery for sick cats

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According to a recent study from the University of Edinburgh in Scotland, higher levels of vitamin D could potentially help the survival rate for hospitalized cats. Blood samples were obtained from 99 hospitalized cats with life-threatening conditions that were admitted to the University’s small animal hospital — and those with higher levels of vitamin D were more likely to still be alive a month after admission.

However, it is too soon to determine if increasing the amount of vitamin D in the diets of hospitalized cats would increase chances for survival, and because too much Vitamin D can be poisonous to cats, owners are urged not to add supplements of their own accord.

Researchers feel that this information could be helpful in studying the complex link between vitamin D and a range of health problems that also affect people.

“At the moment, it is difficult for veterinarians to offer accurate prognostic information to the owners of sick cats,” explained Dr. Richard Mellanby, head of small animal medicine at the Royal School of Veterinary Studies in Edinburgh.

“Our study demonstrates that measuring a key Vitamin D metabolite in the blood predicts disease outcome with a much greater degree of accuracy than many other many widely used measures of disease severity.”

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