Question about food chart

Hi All! I have been using the wonderful, extensive food chart on these boards when choosing wet foods for my newly diabetic cat Emily. Since she can be fussy, and doesn't typically like Pate's, I noticed that a number of the Fancy Feast ROASTED (chicken and turkey) only had 6% carbs, so I tried them, and she loves them. Yes! I have been having a lot of trouble regulating Emily and was poking around the internet to try and find a feline diabetes specialist here in CT and stumbled upon another forum. On that forum they had a carb calculator that you could download and plug in the numbers from your food to find out the DRY carb matter. For kicks and giggles, I did that with all of the cat food that currently occupies my pantry. I was quite surprised to see that these ROASTED FF foods have 21.8% dry matter carb content. Can someone explain (in simple terms) why there would be such a difference in these numbers?? I am now concerned that the food I thought was the "right" choice for Emily (being under 10% carbs) is not, and that fact alone has been contributing to her high numbers and fluctuations. Thoughts? Thank you so much!

 

Hi Mary! I don't know what calculator and values you're using, but I'll take a guess: Most of the carb calculators usually ask you to input the numbers from the can - those are the Guaranteed Analysis numbers and they are listed as minimums and maximums. Are those the values you were using? Those values are imprecise since it might say a max of 78% moisture, but that means the real moisture might be well below that. Same with fats, proteins, ash, etc. Which means that the real values in the can may be quite different from the percents on the label, and therefore the calculations can be quite far off from what is actually being fed.

Unfortunately, pet food companies are not currently required to share their real Metabolized Energy values. Some companies do share those on their websites, or if you email/call and request them. Others won't share their real values no matter what.

Dr. Lisa contacted each company to get their real values, and those are the numbers you see on the chart. If you want to confirm, I would encourage you to contact the companies and ask for the nutrition information. Dr. Lisa has a note at the beginning of the chart that gives some wording for how to ask for it so that you get the values you really need and not just a repeat of the guaranteed values. Companies do change their recipes from time to time, so if you get information that differs from the chart, be sure to post on the thread for the chart and let folks know there has been a change.

Also, if you'd like to post about dosing, we'd be happy to see if we could help with getting Emily into some better numbers. It can certainly be a tricky journey!

 

I think it's because the % carbs from the "dry matter" analysis is higher than the % carbs "as fed". One of the key differences (I think) is that there's no water included in the dry matter analysis and it is part of the as fed analysis.

 

Thank you for your reply. I will contact Fancy Feast and see what I can find out. This "journey" is so frustrating and aggravating! You can see from Emily's numbers in her chart that she is all over the place and most of the time I cannot get her under the 200 mark. The vet is coming on Thursday...I have multiple things I'd like to address with her, so stayed tuned!!

 

Hi Kris, I understand what you are saying, but does this mean when choosing a food you should consider the "dry matter" analysis? Maybe I am making this more confusing than this needs to be?? Just trying to figure out Emily's numbers and ANY reason why she does not appear to be stabilizing. The vet is going to come out on Thursday. In the meantime, I am going to contact Fancy Feast and see what they say, and to make sure there have been no changes to these particular varieties. I will post if there are indeed changes to those particular varieties. Thank you!

 

Oh if you find anything has changed for Fancy Feast Roasted, please post it . Djamila and Kris already answered the main question . I need to contact them about the Creamy delights Chicken and Tuna flavours too . They came out after Dr. Lisa had the new Food Chart up.

 

You want % carbs as fed. The Dr. Pierson food chart on FDMB lists those for many foods.
http://www.felinediabetes.com/FDMB/threads/dr-pierson-new-food-chart.174147/
Unless your kitty is extremely carb sensitive she should be OK with any food under 10% carbs. BG numbers can be high and erratic when a kitty is unregulated and getting to right insulin dosing range trumps small differences in carb %.

 

Hi Kris! The list you have referenced above is the list I have been using when purchasing foods for Emily. Here is the carb chart I stumbled across: http://www.diabeticcatinternational.com/knowledge/calculating-carbs/ When I filled in the information found on the back of the can, to make sure the foods I had are "right" for her, the carb content came out to 21.8% which is a big difference from the 6% listed in the food chart from Dr. Pierson. If it were just a percentage or two, I would not question it, but the numbers here are not even close. Not having a lot of knowledge about cat food, carb content, feline diabetes, etc., it seems a little surprising to me that the numbers are so vastly different. Just want to make sure I am feeding Emily correctly and not being counterproductive.

 

I'm not familiar with the info in the link you included. Most folks here go by Dr. Pierson's list because of the research she put into it. As for me, I just buy Friskies pates for Teasel and don't worry too much about it. I mix them with prescription DM pate that I know to be around 6% carbs as fed.

 

Dr Lisa's food chart "The data used to calculate the values on this chart are from Typical Nutrient Analysis (TNA) data -not the Guaranteed Analysis (GA) data which is listed on the product’s package (can/pouch/bag). GA values are reported as minimums and maximums and are, by definition, inaccurate since there is no ceiling or floor, respectively."

She called every company and got this information herself. She states later that the TNA is more accurate, but all should be taken loosely as one batch may vary from another.

Hope this helps some. For what it's worth we (my household) live by her chart

You can always call a company and ask for the TNA, though some will not give it to you for whatever reasons. As a vet even Dr. Lisa was unable to obtain some of it.