This is a specific conversation about Cat urinary problems — diet and products that help — ask about yours and get one honest answer for your exact situation.
inparticular.ai
It sounds like you've done everything right on paper — premium urinary diets, vet involvement — and you're still not getting the results you need for your boy. That's genuinely frustrating, and it's worth understanding why those foods may have fallen short before adding anything new. Urinary issues in male cats need to be taken seriously; blockages can be life-threatening, and diet is one of the most powerful levers you have. A vet check is important whenever there's an active problem. Can you tell me: what symptoms is he still showing, which foods have you already tried, and what does his current diet look like day to day?
He's a 9-year-old male Chartreux, been seen by the vet, no blockage thankfully. He's had struvite crystals twice now. We've tried Hill's c/d, Royal Canin Urinary S/O, and Purina UR. He eats them fine but still seems uncomfortable and had another crystal episode six months ago. He's mostly on dry food with a small wet portion. I was thinking about adding bone broth to get more liquid into him.
inparticular.ai
The pattern you're describing is really telling. Three good urinary foods, all working on the crystal chemistry, but repeated episodes — that almost always points to inadequate hydration rather than the wrong diet. Struvite management depends enormously on urine being dilute enough to flush crystals before they consolidate, and dry food simply cannot deliver that, even with a wet topper. Your instinct about bone broth is actually sound, but the execution matters. Before I give you a specific suggestion, one question: is he currently on wet food at every meal, or just as an occasional addition to the dry?
He gets wet food once a day, maybe a tablespoon or two, and then dry food is available for the rest of the day. The vet said to increase wet food but he gets bored of it quickly and leaves it. That's why I thought bone broth might help — make the wet food more appealing or pour it over the dry.
inparticular.ai
That's exactly the right reasoning, and bone broth is one of the more effective tools for this specific problem. The key is making sure it's sodium-free and doesn't contain onion or garlic — both common in human broths and toxic to cats. The product I'd recommend here is Honest Kitchen Daily Boosts: Instant Bone Broth for Cats. It's a powder format, which means no preservatives or sketchy additives, it stores easily, and you can mix it into wet food to boost palatability or add warm water to dry kibble to create a gravy your Chartreux will actually want to eat. The low sodium formulation is specifically designed for cats, which matters given his urinary history. Pour it warm — cats drink significantly more when liquid is slightly above room temperature. Alongside this, I'd push hard to replace the free-access dry with scheduled wet meals; the broth can help bridge the palatability gap while he adjusts. His Royal Canin S/O was the right food — hydration is the missing variable.
That sounds manageable. Is the powder version easy to find? And should I still keep him on the Royal Canin S/O or try something different?
inparticular.ai
The Honest Kitchen bone broth powder is available on Amazon UK and tends to stay in stock. Stick with Royal Canin Urinary S/O — it's a well-validated formula for struvite, and the issue isn't the food itself. The goal is to run that food wet and dilute rather than dry. If you can move to three scheduled wet meals of S/O daily, each with warm broth mixed in, you'll be doing far more for his crystal risk than any food switch would achieve. Give it six to eight weeks and then retest urine specific gravity with your vet — you want to see that number come down, which confirms he's actually more hydrated. That's your real metric here.
Really helpful, thank you. I'll order the bone broth and try moving him to scheduled wet meals. Fingers crossed this is the piece we've been missing.
inparticular.ai
I think it genuinely might be. You've been thorough with the diet side — hydration is the lever that often gets underestimated. Warm broth over scheduled S/O wet food is a low-risk, low-cost change with a strong rationale behind it. Keep an eye on whether he's producing larger, paler urine clumps in the litter tray — that's a good real-world sign the hydration is improving. Good luck with him.
