New Member - Question Regarding Food

Hello, everyone My apologies, this will likely be a long introductory post, with my questions at the end.

I am a new member to this site and my handsome boy, Prince, was diagnosed with diabetes around the 3rd week of November 2019. He’ll be 11 years old in April. I’ve attached a photo of my baby He has experienced some past health issues, one being an issue with his liver so I give him 4cc of Detoxafen-L (liver support) once per day.

He is currently on 2.5 units twice per day of Caninsulin. He was originally started at 2.0 units, but was increased as his blood glucose was still high. I have purchased a blood glucose monitoring system (Contour Next) to test his blood. I tested his blood last night approximately 4 hours after he had his evening insulin injection, and it was reading 16.5 mmol/L.

My concern is the food he is to eat. He has always been a picky eater, but I’m finding that after he had his diabetic wet food for a month, he suddenly started turning his nose up to it during his morning feedings (but he’ll eat it in the evening). I was told to feed him 1/4 can of Purina Pro Plan DM wet food, but to entice him to actually eat it I mix in about a tablespoon of Hill’s Digestive Care i/d wet food. I’ve tried to microwave it as well but he still won’t eat it in the morning. We are a multi-cat household, and he loves to go check out the other cats’ dishes during meal times (and will eat their food if they leave any leftovers). I noticed in other discussions that people are feeding their cats Fancy Feast classic wet food. Is this a pate style food? And does it have similar nutrition values as the Purina DM food?

Lastly, I’m noticing he is losing a bit of weight since being diagnosed. He is probably between 12.5 and 13 pounds right now, but is not overweight. He is a large cat and I was told approximately between 13.5 and 14 pounds would be ideal for him. Is it normal for a diabetic cat to lose weight for the first couple of months?

My apologies for such a long post. I’m very happy to have found this type of online community for owners of diabetic cats

 

Hi Catmom, what a handsome boy Prince is!

Most of us indeed feed Fancy Feast Classic (it is a pate) or Friskies Pate. There are many other options as far as food goes, we focus on the carb amount which we keep under 10%, preferably 5% and under.

Here is a complete food chart focusing on do's and don't's along with nutrition facts for almost all wet foods available. Hopefully that link works, I'm on mobile and it's giving me issues haha.

As for the weight loss, totally normal, a cat won't gain weight until they are getting the right amount of insulin for the body to properly utilize food. That goes for too much or too little insulin. 2 units is a lot to start a cat on, we prefer to start 0.5 to 1 unit. You'll see we're heavily data driven here so many people will hesitate to offer dosing advice without BG numbers. It's great that you're home testing. We have a spreadsheet template here where you can fill out the information for us to see.

 

That's actually pretty common...it's liver and most cats get tired of it fairly soon.

Where do you live? It will help us give you better options on low carb foods available. (I know you're not in the US because Caninsulin is called Vetsulin here but in the rest of the world it's Caninsulin)

The DM, besides the problem of having cats refuse to eat it, is also very expensive for what's really a pretty lousy food. There's absolutely nothing in it the requires a prescription or that treats or cures disease. The words "Prescription diet" actually have no legal meaning. It's nothing more than a clever marketing tool between the pet food manufacturers and the veterinary community. By labeling it "prescription" and requiring it be sold by a vet, the food sounds like it's special. It's not. For the same price, you can get MUCH better quality foods. Even the Fancy Feast pates a lot of us feed actually have better ingredients than most of the "prescription" foods.

Caninsulin also isn't a very good insulin for cats. It's much better for dogs (thus the "canin" prefix). There are better insulins like Lantus, Basaglar, Levemir and ProZinc. They're gentler and longer lasting so usually work better in cats that have a higher metabolism than dogs.

Keep asking questions! There's a wealth of experience here to share with you!

 

Thank you so much for your response ! And thank you for the spreadsheet - I will definitely fill it in and repost for people to view I am still a little nervous testing him, my vet told me to just use the lancet without the ejector, but Prince seems to be in more discomfort when I only use the lancet. He doesn't seem to mind too much with the ejector, which is nice. I just tested his blood and it is still quite high (19.9 mmol/L). He is scheduled to receive his dose in a little over an hour. I will definitely be purchasing different types of food for him so he can eat something he enjoys

 

Chris & China (GA), thank you for your response ! Sorry for not being able to respond directly to your comment, I keep receiving an error when I try post my reply.

We live in Canada (just outside of Dryden, Ontario - pretty small town). I will definitely be purchasing him some Fancy Feast to see if he enjoys that more and it's nice that there is some variety in the flavours for him. My vet said that the cats they currently are treating for diabetes all love the DM food, but of course my picky boy has to be the one who doesn't, haha.

I will also ask my vet about a different kind of insulin that is more suitable for cats. I definitely want whatever insulin is the best for my boy so that his BG is in a good range and he starts to act like his silly playful self again

 

Finding a food your cat likes is always a challenge.The good news is that the food chart that Panic's mom, Elizabeth, linked is extensive. It is primarily based on what's available in the US. This is a link to canned foods that are available in Canada.

Prince is not the only picky boy in town! My diabetic kitty was very food motivated and she turned her nose up at DM after a week. The canned DM is relatively low in carbs (7%) but the food is primarily animal by-products. ID is very high in carbs.

It's great that you started testing. Please be attentive to monitoring since you're changing to a lower carb food. Getting Prince on a low carb canned food diet sometimes has a dramatic effect on blood glucose (BG) numbers. In that regard, please pick up several cans of Fancy Feast Gravy Lovers food. This variety is about 15% carb and should by part of your toolkit if Prince's numbers drop low. (Having corn syrup or honey in the house is also a good idea.)

You can mention to your vet that the 2018 guidelines for treating diabetes from the American Animal Hospital Assn recommend either Prozinc or Lantus for treating feline diabetes. (Basaglar is the same as Lantus -- both are glargine). Levemir has a very similar method of action although not as many vets are familiar with its use.

 

Hello from the wet, er, west coast of Canada. Another fan of black and whites here. The majority of the cat foods in the list Panic gave you are available in Canada. I never feed Fancy Feast but fed raw instead. The list Sienne included is unfortunately out dated, mostly missing some of the newer ones like Canada Fresh, much less the many raw options available. On a huge list of “things to do here” is updating that.

We do want foods under 10% carbs, not that important to be under 5% in general. Some cats are more carb sensitive than others. What food are the other cats eating? I found it easiest to get all cats eating the same food.

I too started with Caninsulin, seems there a fair number of older Canadian vets using it. It does work for some cats. The data you gather will tell you if Prince is one of them. I ended up switching to Lantus.

 

Waving to you from central Ontario. Welcome.