30/03/12 Ella food transition and dosing question

Status
Not open for further replies.
tpr

tpr

Very Active Member
Hello everyone,

I've been M.I.A. as I've been at conferences for the last two days. Yay for the weekend!

Here's what's been happening over the last few days. Ella is still on 3u's and I shared the data chart with my vet with my concerns regarding her bounces. She in turn spoke with an internal medicine doctor at the emrgency clinic who stated that her wacky numbers were not bounces as cats don't rebound when they are not even in the normal range. They said her numbers fluctuated from low to hig because I withheld insulin. She wants me to increase her dose to 3.5 immediately and wants her to stay on the diabetic food as she thinks the Wellness has a high fat content which could be harmful for her diabetes.

Has anyone had their cat gain weight from being on Wellness?
Should this be a concern?

When I measured her at +9 today she was 455 which seems awful high. Is it possible that the insulin has been compromised or that it is not being absorbed properly because I injected it incorrectly?

I'm also wondering what is the best way to transition her to soft food with the least amount of stress. My job doesn't allow me to work from home and if I see super low numbers I will freak out and be a complete and utter stress ball!

Hope everyone enjoys their weekend!
 
Re: 30/03/12 Ella food transition question

and I should of stated that I believe you guys in regards to the bounces...I was just sharing what my vet told me:)
 
Re: 30/03/12 Ella food transition question

WOW! I think I would change your subject line to read "dose question/feeding question"

Personally, I think you could use some experienced eyes on the dose increase your vet suggested-

binks loves Wellness...and is a kitty that only gets an hour a day supervised out in the yard...
though he is MEGA-active playing indoors and chasing/terrorizing his adopted sisters :lol:
but he never showed any weight gain from the wellness...
I fed the turkey wellness, not the wellness core.

I think a lot of folks have experienced their vets discounting the "bounce" info...
you're not alone in knowing more about FD at this point than your vet :-D
In their defense (sort of)...they do have to learn a myriad of diseases/treatments for a broad spectrum of species...
so specializing in one disease is not as common for them.

celi
 
Re: 30/03/12 Ella food transition question

If Ella is very carb sensitive, and you are feeding the dry food, you will need to give her more insulin.
If you switch right away to wet food, you should lower your insulin dose because you will see a decrease in insulin needs.

Yes, my Shadoe was very carb sensitive and if she got a mouthful of dry food from the civies, Shadoe's BG would soar into the 400s. She could NOT eat any dry food.

To transition, I would guess if your cat is already eating some wet food, then pick up all the dry now and see how it goes.
It could mean she will need much less insulin, and that's a good thing.

What is the exact food that your vet wants you to feed?
 
Re: 30/03/12 Ella food transition question/dosing increase

Thanks for your responses:) I haven't changed the dosing yet as I don't have the proper syringes.

The vet wants me to feed m/d dry or canned or dm canned.

She is currently on m/d dry at 5/8 per day. She doesn't like the m/d wet and I haven't tried the dm canned.
In my experience, vets don't usually recommend anything other then what's in their shop so I'm not that surprised. I was just wondering what people's experiences were with Wellness and if it affected weight.
 
Re: 30/03/12 Ella food transition question

I guess my concern about raising her dose, Tamara, is that you haven't been able to get any early to mid cycle tests lately. Life happens and we do the best we can.

If you look at the 3/27 pm cycle, she got into low numbers. Some of those high numbers may have been due to the skipped shot but I think she bounced off those low numbers and then the next day, numbers were high because you had to refill the shed but you didn't give her 3u, you gave her 2.5u. So there is some potential she was going lower.

I wouldn't raise her dose if you are going to stop the dry food. In fact, I wouldn't raise her dose right now even if you don't......IMHO. I'd see if you could get some early and mid-cycle tests this weekend and then go from there.

I feed Gracie Wellness.....the chicken, chicken/beef, and turkey. Just as in humans, you have to control the calories. If you give her more calories than she needs, she'll gain weight unless she is extremely active.
 
Hi Marjorie,

I'll do some early and mid cycle tests. For now she will be on the dry until Easter weekend.
 
Re: 30/03/12 Ella food transition question

On her feline nutrition website, Lisa Pierson, DVM has an entire section devoted to transitioning your cat from dry to canned food. Many of us didn't have a problem with just plunking down a bowl of canned food instead of dry. Others aren't so lucky. Gayle is correct in that for many cats, regardless of whether it's a slow or fast transition, you need to be able to keep an eye on the numbers since insulin needs can change dramatically when you reduce the carb content you're feeding.

Here's what's been happening over the last few days. Ella is still on 3u's and I shared the data chart with my vet with my concerns regarding her bounces. She in turn spoke with an internal medicine doctor at the emergency clinic who stated that her wacky numbers were not bounces as cats don't rebound when they are not even in the normal range. They said her numbers fluctuated from low to hig because I withheld insulin. She wants me to increase her dose to 3.5 immediately and wants her to stay on the diabetic food as she thinks the Wellness has a high fat content which could be harmful for her diabetes.
Click to expand...
With all due respect, I disagree with some of the information the ER vet provided. Given that you skipped a shot because Ella's PMPS was lower than what you're comfortable shooting, it does stand to reason that numbers would be high as a result. However, the skipped shot may not be entirely responsible for the high numbers. Rather, the high numbers could also be a result of a bounce. What we have seen is that bounces can result from a cat who's not used to being in normal range numbers dipping into that range OR a fast drop in numbers. In the latter case, it doesn't have mean that numbers fall below 100 or even below 200. It's more a matter of how quickly the numbers drop. While vets may see a number of diabetic cats, I really doubt that they have the kind of data you're collecting from Ella or see the volume of spreadsheets that we do.

I'm also not sure why this vet thinks that the fat content of food influenced diabetes. It used to be that fat content was thought to be a problem for cats with pancreatitis but this is no longer the case. The only concern with a diabetic diet is carbohydrates. If the vet is thinking that a diet that's high in fat contributes to obesity which is not great for diabetes, that's true. But if Ella's weight is his concern, better to limit calories than to have you feed a prescription diet that's typically made of of primarily animal by-products. (There's a lot of information on this topic on Dr. Lisa's website both in the diabetes section and in the commercial canned food section.)
 
Thanks for the article Sienne. I'm sure it will be a good read Saturday morning. One of the reasons why I contacted my vet was to tell her that I thought Ella looked uncomfortable at lower numbers and wanted to bring her attention to her data so that she is aware of all the information before asking me to increase a dose. She called internal medicine as she had never heard of a cat feeling uncomfortbale at low numbers, some of which are not even considered in the normal range. I guess they took it from there and came to their own conclusions.
I will be taking some tests throughout the weekend to see how she is doing on the 3 u's. I told my vet that if we were going to increase that I wanted to do so by.25 and she said they don't do that as the syringes go by 1/2 units. If her numbers deem that she needs an increase I will eye it out to .25 and see how that goes.
Stay tuned for some more testing:)

Thanks!
 
Racci eats Wellness canned every day and she actually lost a little weight since changing from the Purina DM dry. She was very hard to get to eat the wet food but now she eats her favorites very happily and her numbers are much lower.

Melanie & Racci
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top