Newly diagnosed with food question

Hi. My Kitty Chloe is 9 years old and was just diagnosed with diabetes. She is our second diabetic kitty and is on only 1 unit of Vetsulin every morning. We are mostly trying to control her diabetes with Science Diet M/D can and dry. She and our other 2 kitties like the dry but Chloe only likes the canned when it’s first opened. I asked the vet about mixing a tiny bit of a Fancy Feast pate in with the canned M/D and he said that was fine if it gets her to eat the canned M/D. My question is how many carbs are in the Fancy Feast Classic pate. I saw the chart that someone else posted with percentages but is that percentage the percent of carbs per serving? Does anyone else have issues getting their cat to eat M/D canned?

 

Hi and welcome Dawn and Chloe. I'm sorry to hear about the diabetes diagnosis, but you have found a place with lots of information and a strong support system to help you while you learn the sugar dance.

You can read about Vetsulin and how it works in the Vetsulin forum HERE:
Beginner's Guide to Caninsulin (Vetsulin)

I just took a quick look at the Guide and saw this in reference to your vet prescribing one Unit of Vetsulin one time a day.

"A number of different insulins can be prescribed for cats. They work in different ways, but are almost always injected twice a day, every 12 hours.
Your vet has prescribed Caninsulin (Vetsulin). Originally developed for dogs, it is also often prescribed for cats. Because of cats’ faster metabolism, Caninsulin (Vetsulin) may not last in the system a full 12 hours. Typically, it may remain effective for 8 - 12 hours. How long it lasts depends on the individual cat. As we often say, Every Cat Is Different (ECID)."

You may wish to explore this further with other Vetsulin users, perhaps dividing the dose between a morning and an evening injection, so that your kitty gets full benefit from the insulin therapy. You can post about this on the Vetsulin forum or on the Main Health forum for response. Since you are also trying to adjust Chloe's BG with diet, which every diabetic cat care giver is encouraged to do, it's a good idea to test her blood sugar at home to see the effects of the diet change and the insulin therapy. If you are not testing at home, we can help with information, what supplies you need, where to get them, and what the testing process is. Testing is the best way to keep Chloe safe and know, real time, just what the blood sugar is.

Diet is one of the three main components of effective diabetic treatment and we recommend transitioning dry out of the diet as it is too high in carbs, and we have found that the "prescription" canned food is usually higher than the recommended "less than 10% carbs. My cat refused the Hills DM canned because it contained pork, and he doesn't eat pork. Both the dry & the wet went back to the vet for refund when I learned about the carb % of the dry here on the board. In a nutshell, the Rx foods which don't actually require a prescription are not optimal for diabetic cats and are too expensive.

Regarding your question of carb % in a serving of the Fancy Feast classics, I suggest we take this out to the Main Health forum HERE so that more members can read and respond. This forum is only the welcome mat and the Main Health forum is more heavily monitored by the board members. We use the Main Health forum for general health questions and concerns like diet, different food alternatives, blood sugar testing help, litter box issues etc.

You can copy your message here, start a new thread there and paste the message.

I am very glad that you researched and found FDMB. I hope to get to know you and Chloe better, as you learn and continue on this new path.