Vitamin K is also called coagulation vitamin. From its name, we can know that its core physiological function is to promote blood coagulation. At the same time, vitamin K is also involved in bone metabolism.

Vitamin K1 is not currently widely used in pet food supplements due to its cost. The stability of menaquinone in food decreased after extrusion, drying and coating, so the following derivatives of VK3 were used (due to high recovery): menadione sodium bisulfite, menadione sulfite Sodium bisulfate complex, menadione sulfonic acid dimethylpyrimidinone, and menaquinone nicotinamide sulfite.

Vitamin K Deficiency in Cats

Cats are natural enemies of mice, and it has been reported that cats ingested rat poison containing dicoumarin by mistake, leading to prolonged blood clotting time. Many other clinical symptoms, such as fatty liver, inflammatory bowel disease, cholangitis, and enteritis, can also lead to malabsorption of lipids, and secondary vitamin K deficiency.

If you happen to have a Devon Rex cat as a pet, it’s important to note that the breed is born deficient in all vitamin K-related clotting factors.

Vitamin K Needs for Cats

Many commercial cat foods are not supplemented with vitamin K and rely on the action of pet food ingredients and synthesis in the small intestine. There are no reports of vitamin K supplementation in pet food. Unless there is a substantial amount of fish in the main pet food, it is generally not necessary to add it.

According to foreign experiments, two kinds of canned cat food rich in salmon and tuna were tested on cats, which can cause clinical symptoms of vitamin K deficiency in cats. Several female cats and kittens ingested these foods died of bleeding, and the surviving cats had prolonged clotting times due to vitamin K deficiency.

These fish-containing cat foods contain 60 μg.kg-1 of vitamin K, a concentration that does not meet the vitamin K needs of cats. A cat’s vitamin K needs can be met by gut bacteria synthesis in the absence of fish-containing cat food. Cat food containing fish requires additional supplementation to meet the deficiencies in the synthesis of vitamins by gut microbes.

Cat food rich in fish should contain some menaquinone, but no data is available on how much vitamin K to add. The allowable dose of the diet is 1.0mg/kg (4kcal/g), which can be used as an appropriate intake.

Hypervitamin K in cats

Phylloquinone, the naturally occurring form of vitamin K, has not been shown to be toxic to animals by any route of administration (NRC, 1987). In animals other than cats, menadione toxicity levels are at least 1000 times the dietary requirement.

Fish-based cat food, in addition to the need to pay attention to the indicators of vitamin K, also need to pay attention to the indicators of thiamine (vitamin B1)