diabetes & ibs need advice on canned food please

[karentigger]

my cat tigger has diabetes which is thankfully pretty much under control past month finally! now she has ibs, irregular bowel syndrome. please any suggestions of food without wheat glueten, corn not want her sugar spiking again. i was feeding her fancy feast classic & mixed in with the hills prescrption canned but looks like i need to change her diet. when i brought her to vet she was given metrodizone which helps but after i stopped it came right back again. went back on medication & she lost appetite. we tried another medication but it won't keep her ibs under control. any advice on a good canned food. thanks

 

[harrysmom]

Sorry to hear about Tigger!!

I'm curious what flavors of FF were you feeding - the reason I ask is I looked at the flavors that I use (beef, beef&chicken, and chopped grill) and those ones don't have either corn or wheat gluten. Could it be something else that is causing her flare up? Here is a list of some other foods that may be option:

https://docs.google.com/leaf?id=0B8Uu8g ... ist&num=50

Maybe check out the Merrick Before Grain as all flavors have very low carbs and high quality ingredients...right now I have the chicken and it is 96% chicken so hardly any fillers - my kitties also like the beef flavor too

Good Luck!!

Sharon

 

[Traci and Boomer]

How was your cat diagnosed? What are her symptoms?

I used to have a cat who had moderate IBD - Inflamatory Bowel Disease, not IBS. Are you sure you're using the right term? Maybe IBS isn't as serious as IBD - I hope so. My cat was diagnosed at first just by his symptoms and a specific blood test. It wasn't getting better so he had a biopsy done to see exactly what he had.

My cat vomited every day since he was a kitten. (some cats with IBD have diarhea) We put him on pred which worked, but then he became diabetic. Then we switched him to budesonide which is a steroid but it works differently and doesn't cause diabetes. Boomer was able to go OTJ while on budesonide.

My suggestions are Wellness foods which have no grains or any bad stuff in their foods or you can try raw food. There are a few raw varieties - the one I tried was Nature's Variety. My cat Boomer wouldn't eat it but I know people have luck with IBD and raw food.

Then there's the thought that the cat may be allergic to a specific type of food. In order to find out what food she's allergic to you'd need to do a food trial. That's when you put your cat on a diet of a "novel" protien - something she's never eaten before (like lamb or venison) to see if the symptoms go away while she eating the new food. It can be challenging if the cat won't eat the new food. Hopefully you won't need to do this.

There are appetitie stimulant pills. I can't remember the name because I haven't needed them in a while.

 

[nwnews]

HI Karen, there is a food that is grain free and used for cats with food allergies (its single source protein/carbohydrate). Its Natural Balance Duck/Green Pea, Venison/Green Pea and they also now have Chicken/Green Pea and Salmon/Green Pea. My cat, Sitka, has multiple food allergies and successfully managed them using the Duck and Venison varieties. Only drawback is that these foods are a little high in phosporus but not important if your cat doesn't have kidney disease. Wellness also makes a grain free variety but not sure about the ingrediants. The main thing with food allergies is that the protein and carbs are from a single source.

 

[Anyname]

Karen, I hope you return and tell us more of the problem. My kitty is also problematic in the way you are discribing. What are the symptoms when your kitty eats the wrong thing? I gather his bg goes up???? Plus not eating/vomiting? We all try to learn from each other on ways to help our kitties. I'm not in the US so cannot access some of the foods that are ok so my kitty has very few choices re foods that don't upset him. I have been told Evo is ok for my kitty. Venison & Duck varieties and I can get that here. (LB won't eat it unfortunately) Also one very good food that *I think would be ok* is Royal Canin Gastro Intestinal variety. My vet asked me to give it to LB and he does ok on it - but it's dry. I don't think I can get the wet variety in Australia. I think you can get it in the US. I let my kitty have a few pieces of the dry on his raw chicken breast with every meal. It puts his numbers up a little but I have to compensate with extra insulin. It's a bit of a balancing act with these problems.

best
marilyn