Can Diet Change be Enough?

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Pedro T Cat

Pedro T Cat

Member Since 2012
Our kitty, Pedro, was diagnosed with diabetes July 3, 2012. Like most other newbies, I've spent a long time reading about the disease and how to treat it. There is an anomalous factor in Pedro's story, though, and I really want to know what people around here think. Here's the rest of the story.

Early in June he was acting strange. At that time I was not even aware of feline diabetes, but looking back he was displaying classic symptoms. Flooded litter box, lethargic and just really out of sorts. On a whim, my wife went looking for information on his food and discovered our particular batch had a recall on it. We immediately threw it away and replaced it with a higher end dry food (don't remember the brand). At that point we decided to give it a few days and take him to the vet if things didn't improve because we figured it was likely the bad food was causing his symptoms. Within a day or two my wife and I noticed improvements. His friendly disposition was coming back and over a few more days his litter box began to improve. We decided to make a vet appointment anyway, but due to our schedules and the fact he was improving it didn't happen until July 3. By then his litter box was back to normal, and other than looking a bit skinny Pedro was, too. We got the call a few hours after my wife and Pedro returned from their visit. The vet told us everything looked great except his BG level which was 400. All organ functions the blood test covered were normal. He was also down to about 11.5lbs (-3.5 to -4lbs) in body weight.

At that point I launched into my "gather as much info as possible" mode and learned about the usual spike in BG level at the vet and that there are ways to test it at home. That evening we replaced his dry food with wet food and made plans to go to the pharmacy the next day to pick up a meter, which we did. I watched the videos on how to get blood from his ear and we managed (with some fuss) to get our first home reading the afternoon of July 4. It was 205 about 45min after eating. The second test was 206 that evening (also after eating), and this morning (July 5) it was 196 before eating. I was expecting a big drop based on my research and by and large was pleased with the results.

Here's where I need help. Based on the food recall situation, the significant improvements he's shown (symptom-wise) just with the new dry food we started him on, and the potential impact of his new diet of strictly wet food, my wife and I think shooting right away might be a knee-jerk reaction. Based on this information, is the hope of treating him by diet alone too remote or risky to justify? We have a phone consult with our vet Friday, July 5 to discuss options, but I value the input of people like you just as much. Thank you for being here!!
 
Hello and welcome!

I'm still a newbie myself so others will have to chime in but I have seen a few people on here that are able to see huge positive changes based on diet alone... I know for us, we couldn't regulate our kitty UNTIL we switched to wet food that is gluten free. After that, along with insulin, his numbers started coming down and now he is over two weeks without insulin and his numbers have stabilized nicely :) He will be on gluten free wet food for life now :-D

Testing at home is awesome! I'm so glad you are doing that, it's so important..... you should monitor the numbers to see if they come down more, and make sure your food is gluten free!

High numbers are still cause for concern, as they can do organ damage over time. It's the lower numbers or hypoglycemia that can kill quickly that you have to watch out for. There is tons of info on here on how to handle that.

As long as you are testing at home and know how to treat the numbers, you should be fine to see if the numbers go down with diet alone after a few days. But if they don't get into normal ranges you will have to use insulin.

Good luck and keep us posted!
 
Welcome,

Given what you have seen so far with the improvement in his numbers, yes, I would hold off on the insulin at least for a few days and see if his numbers come down into the normal (40-120) range just from the change to low carb food. Insulin is pretty expensive and there's no point spending all that money up front if it turns out he doesn't need any.

I've been "here" for a year, and I've seen quite a few newly diagnosed kitties who can be "fixed" just by the diet change. Hoping that is what happens for you guys too!

If you test just before feeding, then an hour later, you might see a rise. That would be a boost from the simple act of eating. If his pancreas is doing its job, then it will counter that rise by producing insulin which will enable his cells to absorb the glucose from his blood and turn it into energy for the cells. His BG would drop as a result. See if that pattern happens at and after meal times. If you see numbers in the normal range for two weeks, with most numbers in the double digits, then Pedro could be added to the list of "diet controlled diabetics"!

Carl
 
Once Pumbaa was diagnosed in April of this year, I took a week to transition both of my cats to all lo-carb canned food, before starting the insulin, with my vet's blessing.

While Pumbaa still had to go on insulin, at least I didn't have to worry about making that food transition and doing the testing/shooting routine as well. And, there is always the chance that Pedro can be controlled with diet alone. I hope that is the case for Pedro! Good luck!!!!

Suze
 
My cat was one of the lucky ones where diet change alone was enough. At first, the vet wnated to put her on insulin immediately...but Ihad come here and learened avout the fructosmine trest. It shows the average BG in the preceeding weeks. When we got those results, she was borderline: at 487 - 500 being considered diabetic. The vet still thought insulin, but truthfully, I was terrified and decided to give the food change, from all dry to all wet, a chance. I got urine test strips for glucose, and for ketones, and got the BG blood meter. It took me two weeks to finally get a blood sample, and her number was not diabetic. I had watched the urine tests color get lighter and lighter until it was negative.
So, yes, diet change CAN be enough for some. Now, if her numbers had been way high, I might have done something else, but borderline - there is hope.
I truly hope your kitty is one of the lucky ones too!
 
Wow, thank you all for taking the time to reply. It means a lot! His readings so far this evening are consistent with the others. 202 just before eating and 210 two hours after. We'll take another reading in a few more hours. He has accepted the canned food extremely well (literally over night), so we're thankful for that.

I feel like we have some good information for our conversation with the vet tomorrow and we're prepared to shoot if that's what he needs. He's been extremely low maintenance his whole life so if he needs a little TLC now he's going to get it.
 
With those low numbers (low 200's and high 100's) you still might not want to rush right into injecting insulin until you read about the different types available, how they work in cats, and see if your vet recommends the insulins normally recommended here (Lantus, Levemir and Pro-Zinc).

Also, you have time to research purchasing options for the insulin and the syringes and lancets, etc., to keep costs down, since Pedro isn't testing in the 400-500 range. Also, due to the fact that you are already home-testing, having the vet keep your cat for a day or two while they run a curve and decide on a dose isn't optimum due to the stress is causes cats which causes their BGs to go up.

Are you feeding Pedro low-carbed canned food, as in under 10% KCals from carbs? If not, just changing him from the higher-carbed gravy foods to the lower carbed foods might mean you never have to deal with the insulin injections. How cool would that be????

Many people here feed their cats Fancy Feast Classics (they must be the Classics) as those are readily available at grocery stores and Walmart, and their carbs range around 3-5%. Also frequently fed are the Friskies Pates, but those are a bit higher in carbs, like around 4-7%. There are a bunch of food charts out there that list the carb values, some have newer verified information than others. Let us know if you need some links.

I think everyone here would be tremendously happy if Pedro could be controlled by diet and exercise alone!

Suze
 
Welcome!

If you are home testing already that is wonderful!

And changing his diet seems to be working- here is a few food lists:
http://binkyspage.tripod.com/CanFoodNew.html (Binky's page)
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc ... hYXc#gid=0 (Hobo's List)

Look for the cans that are under 10% kcal for carbs- under 5% is better. Try not to feed predominantly seafood as sometimes they will end up only wanting to eat that and nothing else- it is lower in protein and VERY low carbs and doesn't have all the necessary nutrients a cat needs in a steady diet.

Here's hoping Pedro just needs a diet change- remember no more dry food for the rest of his life or FD could come back raring to go.

heather
 
Before purchasing canned food I studied the new and old lists on Binky's page. It, along with other threads here, guided me to the Fancy Feast line and we made our choices based on low carbs and high protein. I think we ended up with mostly "classics" and we'll be sure to avoid too much seafood to avoid getting him hooked on it. According to a chart from his vet visit he should be eating about 300 calories per day and he's only one pound under weight for his size.

He was at 192 this morning before breakfast and I'm getting better with the lancets...only took 3-4 tries on my own to get a measurable drop of blood this time.

One thing I've not yet looked into is how to exercise him. In the morning our routine has always been for him to jump onto our ottoman and I'll pet him for a bit, and then I'll move over to a chair and make him jump up there for more petting. We go back and forth for 5ish minutes before I leave for work every morning and that's the way it's been for a long time (except early June). He does all this very willingly and with no issue, but I don't know if it's classified as exercise. He's got a scratching post which he digs into every now and then, and his water and litter box are up a flight of stairs which he has no problems navigating. He's strictly in door (we live in a high rise) so I'd love to hear some ideas on what else we can do in that department.
 
TOYS! And not the most expensive kinds. Many cats will chase a piece of string - just drag it back and forth across the floor. A soft catnip ball that you can throw for the cat to chase. Some people purchase laser light toys at a pet store - some cats like to chase the red dot. Feathers on a wand is another fav - my cats drag it around and find me and I hold it up so that they can jump for the 'bird'.
 
Instead of a laser light (I don't like using those around animals due to potential eye damage) I just use a flashlight with the beam concentrated. My cats and my mom's cats love chasing the flashlight beam.
 
Fancy Feast is a God send! I originally had my Buttons on Special Kitty but just recently changed her to FF. Its been an up and down kind of few days trying to figure out a dose that is good for her, but I'm happy to say it was a decrease! Im hoping this diet change will allow her to be off insulin sooner rather than later!

I definitely think diet has a huge factor, and I agree with others on here, to wait a bit more and see how his BGs are before going on insulin. You may have to put him on insulin but a very small dose.

Hoping for the best! :-D
 
Toys...of course! I've got a bit of tunnel vision going on I think. My wife chatted with the vet this afternoon and she is completely on the same page as us. She is impressed with what we are already doing to help Pedro and said to keep it up for the next week. She offered to let us use a calibrated meter from her clinic to make sure ours is giving accurate readings. I figure it can't hurt, right? So for now we will proceed with what we've been doing and continue to educate ourselves.
 
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