Slightly Elevated BUN

Okay, I just wrote a huge long thing and this STUPID interface erased it. I'm very annoyed. Reader's Digest version: you need to figure out how much protein is in your stew by weight - and you can simply look up the meat because the other ingredients will add only miniscule amounts. Nutritiondata.com can help you do that.  Then use this information to calculate dry matter basis for your stew. I can help you with shortcuts for figuring out the moisture in your non-meat ingredients if you can't get the info or you have a whole bunch of ingredients.

Then you have to do this with your other foods, including the kibble. You may be surprised at the result! This will give you a comparison of the protein in all the different parts of your diet.

To figure out how much protein your dog is getting by weight, you have to weigh the other food, and calculate the amount of protein in that much food (I use grams for all my calculations because nutrients are typically reported in metrics and the conversions start making my head explode). So 300 grams of kibble that is 25% protein, is 75 grams of protein. Um, I think.

How much is too much? There's no NRC information on maximum safe levels for protein for healthy adult dogs. Their RDA for optimal health is 3.28 per kilogram of the dog's weight to the 0.75 power. So that would be 36.67 grams for a 55 pound dog.

I've seen this a lot. BUN levels seem to fluctuate within a greater tolerance with naturally fed dogs. I have a suspicion that down the road they'll find out this is some healthy function. But who knows? I hope it's just that for you - and most likely it is - generally kidney problems that show up in BUN levels coincide with reduced function that will also have pretty obvious symptoms. 

BUN levels can also fluctuate for reasons other than diet. Ginger had a blood panel done a bit agoand her BUN was elevated a bit. We decided to wait two weeks and test again, before going into any in depth testing. (only because she had no symptoms of a problem). Two weeks later her test was normal.

I have entered the entire recipie on nutritiondata.com and it give me the following values:

weight 9,506 g

protein 1,334 g

water 6,537 g

I'm kinda guessing at how to get the above information into a dry matter basis............ 

1334 divided by 9506 = .14 =14%

6537 divided by 9506 = .69 = 69%   following the DMB formula the stew is 45% protein

Using the guaranteed analysis off the websites and following the dry matter basis formula above indicates that both the kibbles are 28%. 

This batch of stew was enough for 29 days.  That means 9506 divided by 29 = 328 grams per day.

so......he's eating 328 g stew @ 45% protein  = 148 g protein

AND 130 g kibble @ 28% = 36 g protein

IF (and this is a big IF) my math is correct he's getting 184 grams of protein a day !!!!

According to the NRC info on protein above......he should be getting on 42 g per day.

If I have done the math correctly........I obviously need to tweak his "stew" recipe !!

I'm guessing that the elevated BUN is due to the high protein.  He's showing no other signs of a problem and all other values on his bloodwork were normal.

THANK YOU for the help 

 what was his serum total protein level? BUN can also just be elevated from mild to moderate dehydration in addition to a higher protein diet. It varies a lot. Had he been fasted before the blood test?

I don't know the serum total protein.  He was not fasted before the test.  Right now I'm not too concerned.  I would really like to get this math figured out so I have an accurate way to measure the protein as I change the reciepe.  His annual exam is in July.  I think I will get another blood draw and have him fast first.

I'm also realizing that my math above is not right.

I calculated that the stew was 45% protein on a dry matter basis.......then turned around and concluded that he was eating 328 grams a day including moisture.........so 148g protein a day for the stew cannot possibly be right.  

How do I convert this?

 LOL I can't answer the how much protein question  but can say that B's BUN was slightly elevated - we did the urinalysis (he pees on command and is tall enough I just held a plastic container under him) and his urine was quite concentrated. He is on fairly high protein food so I wasn't too concerned - nor was the vet

  Mindy; Are you adding calcium to balance the phosphorus in the meat that you're putting in the stew? Too much phosphorus can be hard on the kidneys but I don't know if balancing the phosphorus with calcium helps as far as the kidneys are concerned; I do know that it's important in other ways. As far as calculating the amount of protein in Baily's diet, let's say you used a pound of lean chuck in making the stew.  I'm using the values for braised lean chuck roast at the USDA website;  http://www.ars.usda.gov/Services/docs.htm?docid=17032   because nutritiondata.com doesn't give the amount of water. It weighs 453 grams and has 253 grams of water and 144 grams of protein. That means it's about 56% water and 32% protein. If you divide the percent of protein by the reciprocal of the moisture the result is 73%; 32% / 44% = 73%, so the meat is 73% protein on a dry matter basis. I use a recipe formulated by Mordanna and it's about 50% meat by weight. The bulk of the meat portion is turkey, which has more protein than beef. On a dry matter basis, the recipe is about 37% protein.

I'm thinking the math isn't right. You'd have to feed around a pound of pure meat to come up with that much protein - I'm sure your kibble doesn't have that much meat! LOL Don't forget you need to guesstimate your moisture INCLUDING the water that's in the stew with the solids removed. You probably would need to strain it to get that figure. Stew has a ton of water - at least mine does. There's some solids still in the liquid you take out of a stew, but that comes out of the ingredients you've already accounted for when you figured out moisture content for the stew - while those ingredients absorbed additional moisture.

Even so, I don't worry about huge protein overages too much. Ted's eating a diet very high in absolute values of protein - he has to - to get a reasonable amount of his energy from meat and animal fat, which I prefer, he eats tons of meat - a lot of boneless meat in fact, which I balance with a smidgeon of homegrown duck eggshell. 

jessies_mom

  Mindy; Are you adding calcium to balance the phosphorus in the meat that you're putting in the stew?

Yes, I am adding ground eggshell to the mixture.

Thanks for the link to the USDA site.  When I have a bit more time, I'll have to plug all the ingrediants in there and do the math again........

I could also submit the recipie for analysis with Mordanna or Monica ...and take the easy way out 

PurplePets22

I could also submit the recipie for analysis with Mordanna or Monica ...and take the easy way out 

   I'm a member of K9 Kitchen and Monica's pretty busy; you would have to wait a few months for an analysis; I'm not sure about Mordanna. Going over the NRC recommended amount of protein shouldn't be a problem. It's been discussed on K9 Kitchen and Monica said she doesn't think it's something to worry about,  but she doesn't like to go too much over the guidelines; not more than 3 times the recommended amount. Don't know if this helps but Jessie's kidney values have always been fine; last test the BUN was 17, and I keep her diet from 35% to 40% protein. She gets the complete (sometimes called super chem) panel once a year.