What food is best for my 11-year-old Airedale with kidney issues and chicken allergy?

Thank you for submitting your question regarding Scooby. I would recommend considering Purina ProPlan Veterinary Diets HA. This a diet made of hydrolyzed soy protein. It is ideal for a dog with a food allergy. Depending on the stage of heart or kidney disease, it can be ideal for those conditions as well. Your veterinarian will let you know based on staging of Scooby. I hope this information helps!

I would look into Nautral Balance Venison and Sweet Potato formula. This is a limited ingredient diet that isn't too high in protein. Foods that are too high in protein can actually cause issues with bladder crystals and bladder stones. I hope this helps!

Dogs are omnivores and can get enough nutrition from a balanced commercial vegetarian food. If you would like to try a meat diet, you could consider a novel protein diet. A novel protein is one that Buddy hasn't eaten before. You could consider venison, bison, fish or duck. Natural Balance makes a number of limited ingredient diets that you could consider. https://www.naturalbalanceinc.com/dog-formulas/special-category-limited-ingredient-diets Another option would be to try a hydrolyzed diet. Those would be prescription only and would be more expensive, but might be a good option as well. I am attaching a handout with more information about diet trials for food allergies below. https://veterinarypartner.vin.com/default.aspx?pid=19239&id=4952600 Good luck! I hope that was helpful. Thanks for using PetCoach.

Thanks for using Petco Pet Education Center, formerly Petcoach! Fortunately, there is an option for Bizu that is a newer poduct from Royal Canin, which is a multifunction pet food. They have a combination diet that is urinary (like he is on) and hydrolyzed protein, which is specifically for allergies. Hydrolyzed diets may use chicken and other proteins in them, but the protein sources are broken down so small that the body doesn't recognize them and they don't cause the itchiness we see with food allergies. This may be a great option for him!

Hi there. For dogs with food allergies, I always recommend feeding a prescription hypoallergenic diet such as Hills z/d or Purina HA if possible. With over-the-counter diets, cross contamination with other ingredients is common - so any of these foods may contain small amounts of chicken, even if this isn't listed as an ingredient. So depending on how sensitive Walker is, he could potentially react to almost any OTC food. A prescription hypoallergenic diet eliminates this risk, so you can be sure that he won't have a reaction :)

Since Cash is a small dog, you might consider one of the more expensive options such as a dehydrated or fresh food diet. They are able to control their ingredients much more easily than a large manufacturing plant does that makes dry food. I have been very pleased with The Honest Kitchen ( https://www.thehonestkitchen.com/ ) and Just Food For Dogs ( https://www.justfoodfordogs.com/ ). Both have foods that will not have chicken and both have options without any poultry. You do not have to worry about the potential addition of chicken fat which a number of dry food companies do as well. If those are not good options for Cash, then you may consider a canned food which again will generally be safer than a dry food at making sure there isn't any chicken contamination. I have been pleased with Natural Balance Limited Ingredient Diets ( https://www.naturalbalanceinc.com/ ), but be sure to read the labels carefully. Good luck! I hope that was helpful and gives you some ideas. Thanks for using PetCoach.

If you think that the HD is the cause of the sudden severe allergic reaction, than switching foods might help. However, in my experience, sudden severe allergic reactions don't typically occur from foods. Typically they are from something else in the environment. With regards to food, another good choice for cardiac disease is the Hill's or Purina Kidney Diet. The kidney diets and heart diets have very similar ingredients due to the fact that they are both attempting to control the same things. The good news is that the majority of both dogs and cats absolutely love the way the hill's K/D diet tastes. Hope this makes sense.