Pancreatitis hospitalization and new food management help for Reid

Hi folks.

I haven't posted on here since Reid had all of his teeth taken out sometime in the beginning of this year. A couple days ago I had to take him in to the emergency hospital because he was vomiting consistently throughout the day and not eating (unheard of with him) and lethargic. He stayed 24 hours for IV and observation and they told me he had pancreatitis with a gastrointestinal infection and he was dehydrated. The bloodwork came back and showed no ketones in his urine, kidneys, liver, etc. are fine. I came home with buprenorphine and clavaseptin - both of which he's had in the past and he has finished his medication rounds yesterday.

The next day he was back to his normal self. Appetite is back, no lethargy, no vomiting. He's always been food motivated and ALWAYS wants to eat, that's how I knew something was wrong. He's back to waking me up at 8am to feed him and following me into the kitchen at all hours because he knows that the food is in there and thinks he'll get something.

I wasn't testing him as much before because he seemed to have stabilized on 4 units of caninsulin which he was getting twice a day. His urine wasn't sweet anymore, bowel movements were like clockwork, and when I did test him his numbers were consistently between 8-10 so I stopped testing him as much and doing curves. Now I feel foolish. The vet bumped him up to 4.5 units and said if I don't see improvement in his numbers in 7 days to bring him back for more bloodwork to see how much to increase his insulin. He's always had issues with high numbers in the past (never low - not once) so this isn't new for him to be hyperglycemic pretty much most of the time when he's not regulated (if that makes sense?)

He was eating different varieties of Friskies pates and Fancy Feast but I'm going to change his food to just Fancy Feast Pate starting tomorrow. I'm really terrible with math and I am wondering how many tins he should be eating a day? I bought the 85g tins of the Turkey & Giblets Feast and Turkey Liver & Chicken Feast. He's 7.8 kilograms.

I need help getting him onto a normal schedule. When I was working, he was eating 3 - 4 times a day on a fairly consistent schedule (8am, 4pm, 8pm weekdays / 8am, 12pm, 4pm. 8pm weekends.) I'm not working right now, so he's eating 4 times a day, but when I find a job, the hours won't be the same as my last job. I assume it would make more sense to get him on a twice a day feeding schedule since I won't be here to feed him at 12 and 4 (or anyone else) so I'm thinking 8am and 8pm? I have no idea?

I don't know how to do a google spreadsheet, but someone made me one in the past and I added what his home testing numbers have looked like these past 4 days. I'm definitely going to AM/PM test him and I'll keep his spreadsheet updated but if anyone wants to help me fix it to make sense to people or tell me how to fix it that'd be great.

I honestly still haven't a clue what I'm doing so I would appreciate any help going forward.

Thanks everyone!

 

You can keep him on his current schedule if you wish by using a timed feeder to dispense his food at the required time. I'd suggest looking at the Petsafe 5 and the Cat Mate C500 (usually available at fairly good prices on eBay or Amazon, and sometimes there are good special offers on the Petsafe 5).


Mogs
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Perfect. Thank you. I’m going to order him the Cat Mate C500.

I just need to figure out how many tins to feed him? If he’s eating Fancy Feast 85g would 4 tins a day be too much or too little?

 

Hi Jack, I just looked at your SS and you need to make some adjustments there.
Here is a link to understand the SS
https://www.felinediabetes.com/FDMB/threads/understanding-the-spreadsheet-grid.156606/

Each line is for one day and you put the numbers in along the line for the day.
So there is AMPS which is the test you do before the shot, then +1 is the first square along the line, +2 is the second square etc and the PMPS goes in the column that says PMPS. The. You start again with the PM cycle still going along the line +1 in the first column after the U column which is the one after the PmPS column.

Have you thought about changing to a longer acting more suitable for cats insulin such as Lantus which in Canada does not need a script.?

 

As a very rough guide, a cat at ideal weight and not in high BG numbers needs about 20 kcal per lb of body weight per day to maintain weight (e.g. 200 kcal/day for a 10lb cat).

If Reid is at ideal weight at 7.8kg:

Weight in lbs = 7.8 x 2.2 = 17lb (to nearest lb).

Approx daily caloric requirement = 17 x 20 = 340 kcals/day.

If you pop onto chewy.com you can look up the Fancy Feast varieties that Reid will be eating, e.g:

https://www.chewy.com/fancy-feast-classic-chicken-feast/dp/103887

If you scroll down the page and then click on the Nutritional Info tab it'll give you details of how many calories are in each 3oz/85g can. IIRC, the range is about 90-99 kcals/can, so for a regulated cat at ideal weight it would need about 3.5 x 3oz/85g cans per day.

Because Reid is currently running in fairly high BG numbers it's possible he may not be able to fully utilise all the food he is eating and you may need to feed him more than the 3.5 cans per day until his BG gets into a better range and he gets the full benefit from his grub. (Similar would apply if he were underweight and needed to regain a little.)

(@Bron and Sheba (GA) - Bron, would you be able to provide a rough guideline on how much extra to feed an unregulated cat, please?)

I've found the following to be very helpful in managing a cat's weight:

1. Keep a basic journal with amount of food eaten each day. (Can be very simple, e.g. "DD.MM.YY: 3 cans FF chicken paté")

2. Use a reasonably priced digital baby scale to check weight once a week.

3. Assess physical appearance weekly against a body condition chart.

4. If underweight, feed a little more for the next 7 days; if overweight, feed a little less (see this page at catinfo.org for guidelines on how to safely help a cat to gradually lose weight).

5. Rinse 'n' repeat.


Mogs
.

 

7.8 Kg is quite heavy for a cat.
Is he a big cat?
Or overweight at all?

I would not let the vet bump him up more than 0.25 U of insulin at a time. Caninsulin is a fast acting insulin that doesn’t really last 12 hours so you are going to get higher numbers at the end of cycles. If Reid is not regulated on caninsulin by now, I would look at swapping over to a longer lasting more gentle insulin such as Lantus?
If you can get the SS fixed up as I mentioned above we will be able to see much more easily what is happening.

 

Thank you for this! I have fixed his spreadsheet. I'm not opposed to changing his insulin I just am nervous because I don't know much other than how to give him his injection. I'll talk to my vet this week and see what they say. It's always stressful because every time I have a question about his diabetes (and this has been true for all the vets he has gone to until I found this one who at least takes the time to explain things to me unlike all my other experiences with past vets) they want him to come in for bloodwork before they answer my questions and the cost is killing me.

 

Thanks for this! I fixed his spreadsheet. I'm sure his body was freaked out (and it freaked me out) when he went from 4 to 4.5 so I took him back down to 4 units and today he starts 4.25 units.

He is a big cat yes but he's definitely overweight. He has progressively been gaining weight as he has gotten older. When he had his teeth out at the beginning of this year he weighed somewhere around 16ish pounds and we're at the end of the year now with no teeth and he's up to 17ish.

 

Thank you this was very helpful! I'm going to keep him on the Fancy Feast Classic Tender Liver & Chicken Feast (97 kcal/can according do Chewy) at 8am/12pm/4pm/and 8pm and see if that helps stabilize his BG. I'm more concerned about getting him regulated than I am with him losing weight at this moment although his weight also contributes to his diabetes so it's a vicious cycle *sigh*