? Poultry-free, grain-free, ultra low carb canned food?

Pants has IBD and appears to be allergic to chicken and is currently eating Royal Canin PR. It stopped the barfing, but is 15% carbs. Does anyone know of a completely chicken-free ultra low carb food I could try switching her to? My goal is under 5% carbs and grain free.

I've been checking out alternatives using the food chart, but most of the fish-based low carb foods contain chicken or chicken broth as secondary ingredients. The vet said to stay away from turkey, too, but I know she does OK with duck.

Pants was in remission for more than a year, and at first seemed to do OK on the PR, but then trying steroids caused her blood sugar to jump and it's not going back down on its own. Her un-medicated numbers are all over the place (200 - 530 in the same week), and she's super sensitive to insulin, so even at the high end, she's still at risk of hypo. She crashed at the vet last night from a .5 dose of Lantus -- her BG fell from 430 to 50 in about 90 minutes. The vet thinks pro zinc might produce a gentler drop than Lantus, but also suggested trying lower carb food at home to see if that helps her body fight the hyperglycemia on its own.

 

I think there was another person asking about this in the fb group either Feline Diabetes or Sugarcat Support Group. I dont remember which one. Not sure if they figured it out but you can check there too.

 

Thanks. I was sitting around this afternoon with time on my hands, so I ended up just filtering the food chart to only show foods below 5% carbs and then looking up the ingredients of non-chicken varieties. I decided to try to avoid beef and pork as well for now, so I ended up ordering Hounds & Gatos lamb and Fussie Cat tuna with salmon, which are both 1% carbs. Hopefully one of those will appeal to her, but if not, both of those brands have other low-carb grain free options that don't include chicken.

 

Merrick's Limited Ingredient diet varieties and Perfect Bistro Rabbit have no fish or chicken. The LID's are low, several other Perfect Bistro flavors are low but Rabbit in that line was missed so no idea on carbs. Doc can eat rabbit with numbers that say likely 5% - 6% or so. The 'Back Country' line rabbit says 12 % and IS! Got it by accident - Doc sat on the moon for hours until it was all gone.

 

Rawz has a rabbit product now. Natures Variety lamb, rabbit or venison are all LC. Lots of raw food options for low carb, alternate proteins.

 

I second the suggestion of raw foods. there are good options that fit your criteria. Also, regarding the Lantus v. Prozinc - I think it's unlikely that prozinc will give a more gentle drop. It nearly always results in a steeper curve than Lantus. That being said, it's possible that Lantus just isn't a good fit for your kitty. Maybe Levemir? I'm not as familiar with that one, but my understanding is that it is more akin to Lantus in having longer flatter cycles.

 

Thanks, all. The Merrick limited ingredient rabbit just changed formula and now includes chicken broth, so unfortunately, that's out unless they change it back. The Merrick salmon limited ingredient is very low carb though, so if she's OK with salmon, that might work. The Rawz and the Nature's Variety also look like great options if she rejects or can't tolerate the two I ordered. She's picky, so it's great to have more choices for her.

The suggestion for Levemir is a good one. The vet who suggested Prozinc is a substitute who was in for Thanksgiving and was not terribly interested in my views on anything, but Pants's main vets are more open, so I'll suggest Levemir if she crashes on the Prozinc too. The logic the substitute vet gave for Prozinc didn't really make sense to me -- she thought the issue with Lantus was that it builds up in the body. That theory matched the pattern the last time around, as Pants was fine for a few days, then started overreacting. But this time, she crashed from the very first dose, so I don't think that could be the problem.

 

That is actually correct - Lantus is a depot insulin and you usually don’t see the true reaction to a dose change until you’ve given about 6 doses. It IS possible for one dose to drop blood sugars too though. ProZinc is an “in and out” insulin, and each cycle of blood sugars reflect just the dose that was given at the beginning of the cycle, not the previous 3 days like Lantus. I have considered switching my cat to ProZinc when he was alive because his sugars were very erratic too due to his other conditions. But i had a ton of Lantus pens and wanted to use them, since they are expensive.

Hope this helps.

 

Right, but Pants doesn't have a depot. This wasn't a dose change -- she hadn't had any insulin at all in over a year and crashed from her very first dose of .5 of Lantus.

A non-depot insulin may well be better for her, since it lets me play with the dose more effectively. But unless I'm missing something, that Lantus builds up in the body cannot explain a cat going into hypo in under two hours from the first dose.

Perhaps what the vet meant was that it's only going to get worse if that's how badly the first dose went...

 

gotcha, sorry I didn’t look at your SS. That just means that the starting dose was too high.

 

No, you’re right with what you’re saying. For some reason i can’t see your insulin doses on your SS. So I’m a little limited with dose advise here. When did he bottom out? I don’t see any hypos on the SS.

However, based on what you’re saying, since you’re just starting out again, I wouldn’t switch yet. Try 0.25 units and see how he does on that. Maybe he won’t require a lot of insulin or perhaps he won’t need it at all after a few doses. He did go into remission once so maybe he will again.

 

Something seems to be wrong with your SS. Could not view recent bg?

 

i don't have full data as she's hospitalized, so it's not me doing the testing and they don't tell me all of her numbers. I added what I know.

Wednesday night, she fell from 430 to 50 from .5 of Lantus in about 90 minutes, so they gave her glucose by IV. That was her first dose of any insulin since July 2017. They won't do .25 of Lantus because they claim it cannot be measured accurately. I know that's wrong, but they wouldn't budge, and I don't think I can try it safely at home. My guess is .25 is enough to provoke a scary hypo, and she crashes so fast that there's a risk I can't get her to the hospital in time.

They tried Prozinc last night, and she reacted much more normally: 377 pre-shot, 85 at +7.

 

My cat Jackson has been on Dave's cat food 95% they have several varieties that are poultry free and it's not horribly expensive.

 

As between the Fussie Cat tuna and the Hounds & Gatos lamb, she chose the lamb. That worked out well for me -- the tuna one was way more expensive and made my entire apartment stink of fish! Hopefully it will be OK for her angry tummy. But in case not, the vet gave me names of veterinary nutritionists. So I'm going to set up a consult and get some expert advice.

 

Thanks. It's good to have lots of backup plans in case the Hounds & Gatos doesn't agree with her.

 

Cleo likes Red Barn lamb. She's not crazy about their other varieties, but lamb is a big hit. It doesn't contain chicken or turkey.

 

Thanks! Do you know what percent of the Red Barn is carbs? I see it's a pate, so it's probably pretty low...

 

I don't know. Her blood sugar is the same on Red Barn as when she eats Fancy Feast, so I guess they're similar in terms of carbs.

 

OK, thanks.

I also just learned that the food chart hasn't caught a new formulation of Nature's Variety Instinct limited ingredient rabbit -- it's very similar to the Royal Canin PR in terms of ingredients, but is 9.4% carbs. That's higher than I'd like, but still a major improvement over the PR's 15%. Hopefully one of the lower carb options will work, but if it turns out she really needs a limited ingredient specialty food, it may be worth a shot.

 

There was a discussion about Red Barn here:
http://www.felinediabetes.com/FDMB/threads/dr-pierson-new-food-chart.174147/
Someone who contacted the company said that the lamb pâté is 2% carbs (as fed).

 

Where did you find the Hounds & Gatos lamb? I'd like Coco to try it but can't find a pet store that carries it. As picky has Coco is, buying a case isn't a good option.

 

I had the same problem. Even my local fancy pants independent pet food store didn't carry the lamb variety, so I ordered it online from Chewy, which unfortunately forces you to buy a whole case.

 

Thankfully Chewy has a great return policy! I may try it with her next food shipment.

 

Have you checked out Tiki cat food.

 

I hadn't -- it wasn't obvious to me what was in each one from the names, so I didn't look them up. But now you pointed them out, they have great nutritional profiles and no bad things she needs to avoid. I also like that you can get a variety pack of fish flavors to let your kitty try them all out.

She's still eating the Hounds & Gatos, but as her blood sugar is falling and she's less ravenous, she's less enthusiastic about it. But she's eating enough that it's not worrisome, and she's not having any tummy upset so far, so that's good. I'm sticking with it for now, but expecting to need other options.

 

You can also check Canidae Pure limited ingredient pate-duck.