Changed to raw food and cats blood sugar remains high

Hello again,
How much does the Insulin dose need to drop when giving raw food? I changed Carbonel to Natural Instinct cat food and her blood sugar remained high over a period of 8 days. I had to revert back to the Hills, whereapon her blood sugar dropped and then shot up and has remained high ever since. I have tried this Natural Instinct cat food before unsuccessfully. Any British people on here giving their cats this food? I worry about the blue berry in it. They said this is an anti-oxidant!! I am not sure whether the food is the problem or whether I am giving too much Insulin. I made my own organic food a couple of years ago but unfortunately my supplier was unreliable.
Thank you so much,
Carol and Carbonel

If I'm remembering correctly, on Dr. Lisa's site on feline nutrition she made the point that while an ingredient like blueberries may not be important in a cat's diet, if the overall carb count for the food is low, these kind of ingredients obviously aren't making a significant contribution to the overall amount of carbs. I believe she used Wellness as an example. Some of the varieties will contain sweet potato or blueberries or cranberries but the carb count for chicken and turkey flavors is 4%.

One thing that many of us have experienced is that it can take more than a few days for our kitties to adjust to a change in diet. There's no rule of thumb for how long it can take, though. When I was feeding raw, Gabby initially had some GI upset from it but within 10 days it was resolved. I don't recall if the switch to raw had an effect on her BG numbers, though.

I didn't change Gabby's dose when I fed raw or when I went back to Wellness. As long as you're feeding low carb, the dose shouldn't be effected. If you have a spreadsheet for Carbonel it would be helpful to take a look in order to make an other suggestions. On the surface, it sounds like maybe Carbonel isn't getting enough insulin.

A spread sheet is a good way to keep tabs on Carbonel's BG #s, and for the experts, like Sienne, to see how things are going. She, and the other experts on here, will be able to advise you on how much insulin is required at any given point. They're experts at reading #s. Good luck, and welcome!

Hi Carol and Carbonel-
I don't really have an answer for you but just wanted to let you know that we feed Fur Ball the NV Instinct Raw Chicken. We were able to transition him from dry kibble to raw within about 2 weeks after his dx and now that is all he eats. He's been OTJ for 6 months. If carbonel can tolerate it, my thought would be to stick with it. And as the others recommended, if you could post your spreadsheet the people on here are amazing and can offer some good feedback and insight.

Karen

Thank you so much Sienne and Angela. I do have a spreadsheet and it needs updating, as I have not included the last 2 weeks' figures. I will have to do it tomorrow now.
Surely blueberry extract is high in sugar. I read Dr Lisa's site ages ago and that is where I discovered that one needed to decrease the insulin when changing to a raw food diet. She said, 'If the insulin is not lowered accordingly, an overdose of insulin will occur which can be life-threatening'.
I don't know whether I should go back on the raw ( she eats it happily) food because she has been high so long now. Natural Instinct (raw food) contains wild rabbit with liver, heart and bone (99%), Scottish salmon oil, brewers' yeast, sea kelp and bilberry powder.
Thank you,
Carol and Carbonel

Carol --

What Dr. Lisa was warning about was switching from a high carb (usually dry food) diet to a low carb diet while not simultaneously reducing the insulin dose. Maybe I was misunderstanding your post since I was assuming you had Carbonel on a low carb diet already. If you're switching from one low carb type of food to a different low carb food, there's no need to adjust the dose.

Hello again,
I have updated Carbonel's bloods, which are really depressing. :sad: I took her to the vet on Friday as I felt she was poorly.
The vet said (after looking at the last blood glucose curve, which was good) that she was fine, (not in my opinion, the vet felt a high of 19 pre-shot was okay too) but said that she was too thin and that I should give Carbonel more food. I have increased the food but I feel her bloods have been too high too long and that whenever she has more Hills I cannot control her blood sugar levels. I feel very anti Hills (and anti the vet) as I feel that the dried prescription diet prescribed for her irritable bowel 5 years ago, caused her diabetes. Carbonel does see another Homeopathic vet (very expensive) but only to get the prescription for the Glargine. In fact everything is expensive in the UK. The test strips cost a small fortune! The needles I use are not accurate either, I have just recently devised my own scale in order to try and give Carbonel the same Insulin.

Last summer Carbonel was on .75 Insulin and was doing really well. Unfortunately I tried reducing the Insulin, because she was consistently very low, and her numbers shot up. As I hadn't been on this site for sometime (due to a virus) I didn't realise that you should hold the dose for longer than 3 days. I have therefore been giving her too much Insulin for too long. She has gone from being a healthy diabetic cat, who has been on Insulin for 4 years, to a very unwell cat.

I don't know what to do next. I need to get her blood/glucose levels to come down as soon as possible. I don't feel I can let her stay high for much longer. Should I now put her back on to raw food? I plan to post a separate message to see if there are any British diabetic cat owners who are using Natural Instinct successfully.
Thank you,
Carol and Carbonel

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc ... sharingnot

Carol -

The Hill's products, even the "diabetic" diet, are fairly high in carbs. If you're feeding the canned M/D, it's 14% carb -- what we'd consider a medium carb food. If your vet is insisting on a prescription canned food, the Purina D/M is 7% carb. Neither of these brands has impressive ingredients -- they are mostly animal by-products vs. muscle meat. The raw foods that are commercially prepared here in the US are all very low in carbs and would be a better choice than a 14% carb food. I know there are members in the UK who have found canned foods that are low in carbs. You may want to post on the Health board here and ask about foods that are available in the UK.

You might want to think in terms of calories per day vs. the amount of food you're giving. Calories can really vary from product to product. Dr. Lisa's website on feline nutrition has a formula for calculating the approximate calories per day for your kitty:
She notes that this is a "generous" calculation so if Carbonel needs to gain weight, it may be fine or you may want to provide more calories than what's noted given what would be a good weight for Carbonel.

Thanks for updating Carbonel's SS. On the days when you don't have an AM dose listed, did you skip the shot?

You're correct in that if a cat is in consistently good numbers you can hold the dose. If a kitty is in normal numbers (50 - 120) for a week, you can try to reduce the dose. Since Carbonel has been diabetic for a while, you may want to think about shaving a dose rather than a 0.25u reduction especially if your finding that dose reductions aren't holding.

Right now, what it looks like to me is that Carbonel may need more insulin. I would, however, encourage you to get at least one test per cycle when you can. It looks like you're not consistently getting PM tests. If it's feasible, can you always get a "before bed" test? The spot checks will help you to know if Carbonel's numbers are dropping lower in the middle parts of the cycle and then bouncing back up by shot time.

I'd also suggest evaluating the dose every 3 days/6 cycles. If Carbonel's numbers aren't where you want them, then consider increasing the dose. My concern is that if you hold a dose that is leaving your kitty in higher ranges for overly long, glucose toxicity can develop. What this means is that Carbonel's body gets used to being in higher numbers and treats that range as "normal." If this happens, it can make it harder to bring the numbers down. I'd also encourage you to think in terms of getting Carbonel to a dose that works. I wouldn't worry about the 0.75u being a good dose last summer. The only good dose is the dose that is currently working best for your cat.

ETA: Regarding syringe accuracy, there are several people here who use digital calipers to insure dose consistency. I'm going to ask Marje to stop by. I don't use calipers but she does and she can offer some input on the topic.

Thanks Sienne,
This is all very helpful. I do feel that Carbonel may have developed this glucose toxicity and this is why she comes down and, even though I haven't changed anything, she just goes up again. You say that when this is the case, it is difficult to get blood/glucose levels down again. Difficult, but not impossible, I hope? Dr Lisa does mention Natural Instinct food. I think the carbs are less than 0.1%.
I always test morning and evening pre-shot, (any numbers not there, I have omitted in error). However, I go out to work in the day and can only get my husband to check midmorning for me sometimes. I generally check when I come in from work in the afternoon and try to do a curve on the weekends. Did you mean I should check at 11pm when I am off to bed, as I sometimes have in the past? I have some raw food and will work out how much Carbonel needs based on your equation and go from there.
Kind regards and many thanks,
Carol and Carbonel

Is this the food you are using? http://www.naturalinstinct.com/categories/Cat-Food/ I think the food you saw Dr. Lisa mention is Nature's Variety Instinct and it is a different company. According to the website I show, carbs are <0.1%, so that shouldn't be a cause for high BG. Just because a dose was good before doesn't mean that it is good now. Most of us adjust doses frequently, as is needed and seen by testing.

Actually, the formula that Sienne gave you is for calculating calories for weight loss. If you aren't trying to get Carbonel to lose weight cats need 20 to 30 kcal per pound body weight per day, depending on activity level. (For example my Tess gets 20 kcal per pound since she is indoor only, 15 years old and sleeps a good part of the day, civvie Emma is only 2 years old and very active and into everything! She gets 30 kcal/pound/day.) Unfortunately, i dont see a kcal count on their site. Perhaps it is on the packaging or you can call the company.

BTW the ingredient is Bilberry not blueberry, it is used as a supplement for

A bilberry is a blue fruit that looks, tastes and behaves like a blueberry. In fact, if you look at the picture above it’s hard to tell a difference between one and the other.
Its formal name is Vaccinium myrtillus, and also goes by the name of Huckleberry. Like other bright flavored fruits it has a remarkable array of health benefits. In addition to the typical benefits of a berry it also has the following unique properties:
-- helps improve eyesight and prevent macular degeneration
-- helps control blood sugar
-- helps improve circulation
In the past bilberry has been used to treat diarrhea, night blindness, and in a few instances control blood sugar in diabetics.

Click to expand...

Thanks Ann,
I feel a lot better about the Natural Instinct now. It says on the packaging that kcal/100g is 114. I worked out that Carbonel would need aproximately 120g a day based on the feeding guide on the packet. They suggest 2-3% of their ideal body weight . I think Carbonel's ideal body weight is about 3.8kg which is 9lbs 5oz I think. Does she need 165g of food a day then?

I would appreciate some more info on the caliper that Sienne has suggested for measuring Insulin accurately.

Thank you all,
Carol and Carbonel

I don't disagree with Ann. I think any calculation you use needs to be assessed by weighing your cat. Just like with humans, some individuals/cats will gain or lose weight on the identical number of calories. Whether you use the formula from Dr. Lisa's site or the one Ann provided, check on Carbonel's weight to see if the number of calories is helping him to gain weight. (The formulas are actually pretty close. If you use a 10 pounds as an ideal weight, Dr. Lisa's formla would come out to 206 calorie where as the 20 kcal per pound approach would result in 200 calories.) Another possibility is to add something that's very dense in calories. I think Marje is adding coconut oil to one of her civvies food.

Many of us are not around for part of the day due to work or school or other obligations. If your DH is able to get a mid-day test in, that's wonderful, especially if you've left for the day and are worrying about Carbonel. PM cycle tests can be particularly important since some cats tend to run into lower numbers at night. If you can get a couple of tests in, especially one before you go to bed in the evening, that would be great. It will also tell you if Carbonel's numbers are dropping and if he's bouncing by the next day.

As for glucose toxicity, probably the majority of our cats were experiencing glucose toxicity before they were diagnosed. So, it is always possible to overcome the problem should it arise. My point in mentioning it was so you were aware that it's important to evaluate the effectiveness of a dose after no more than 3 - 7 days. If you see that a dose isn't putting Carbonel's numbers in a range that you're happy with, then increase the dose.

Thank you Sienne,
Thank you most of all for the encouraging last paragraph. It is almost dinner time for Carbonel. She is going to be so pleased to be getting the raw food again. I wish I could put all my cats on this, it is jus too expensive. However they are all on Bozita, not on Hills!
Kind Regards,
Carol and Carbonel

I'm not entirely sure about cost but if you have the time, if you are able to make your own raw food, it costs the same or less than buying canned food. It's definitely less expensive than prescription food. Dr. Lisa's website has a recipe for a nutritionally complete raw diet. I think the initial expense for all of the supplements may be a little costly but the price per portion may be worth it. The biggest issue for me was that it was time consuming. I would made a good sized batch and freeze the food in 1/4 cup portions that I could defrost as I needed it.

Hi Carol

Sienne asked me to drop in for a couple things.

I give my elderly, non diabetic cat 2.5 mls of extra virgin, unrefined, cold pressed coconut oil twice a day (bid), at the advice of my vet, to help his weight. He's done very well on it and his weight loss stopped and he even gained a bit. He does have kidney disease. If you start on coconut oil, you need to start low, like .25 ml (read POINT two five) twice a day and slowly build up. But I would discuss with my vet as to the amount she might feel is warranted for Carbonel...if any. I will tell you that I had my FD kitty, Gracie, on 1 ml coconut oil bid just so she would not have hairballs and because it makes their coats gorgeous, but it caused her triglycerides to increase in her bloodwork. BUT, she is the only one I know that has been affected that way. My other two cats are on it and it did not raise their triglycerides and another member's FD cat is on coconut oil and it did not raise her cat's triglycerides. This seems to be solely a Gracie thing but it would bear watching. Coconut oil has no carbs or sugar and my cats love it....lick it off the plate.

As far as dosing, all of the US syringes I have used are extremely inaccurate. I bought a set of Digital Calipers and started using them and it has increased my accuracy tenfold. In fact, I don't even look at the markings on the syringes anymore. I did a post on Dosing with Calipers which tells you how to do it. I would think you could easily get some digital calipers at a hardware store or Amazon.com also carries the same brand.

Once you look through the information in the post, if you have any questions, please let me know. I'll be glad to help you figure it out. I have seen homemade scales and, personally, I found them really hard to use and not as accurate as the calipers which read in millimeters.

Thank you for the info on the calipers Marje. I have looked on line and found something similarand I will let you know if this solves my dosing problems.I gave Carbonel 80g of the Natural instinct this morning and last night and she seems hungrier than ever. She has been trying to snatch the other cats food as well, poor thing, even though her blood sugar is slightly less than yesterday.
Kind regards,
Carol and Carbonel

Hi Carol

It takes a bit of time before they are not so ravenous.

Let us know how we can help.

Hi Marje and Sienne, Carbonel is ravenous all the time now, even when her blood sugar is low. I suspect there is something else going on as she has been high for far too long. I am not sure whether the food is making her poorly or whether she is just very ill. She feels damp and is moving around very slowly. I wondered whether her kidneys were failing.
Here are her latest no's. I started the raw food on the evening of the 14th and her numbers looked as if they were coming down and now they have shot into the red again. I feel like I cannot win. Just when I think her blood sugar is coming down it shoots right up again as you can see from the spreadsheet. :cry: I give her her food at exactly the same time everyday. I weigh her food. What could have caused this leap? It is not as if she has dropped that much that she should have bounced. I thought I might increase her insulin tomorrow morning, do you think this is a good idea?
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc ... sp=sharing
Thanks so much
Carol and Carbonel