Food question from new Diabetic cat owner

[Edington]

My Cat Taffy (8 years old domestic Long hair) was diagnosed with Diabetes on Monday, she's got her first course of Caninsulin and is actually responding well though my vet was still a little worried with her glucose counts so the dose has been has been doubled to 2 units twice a day.

Right now she's being fed a good Harringtons which isn't great for her condition I know and I do have some thrive 90% chicken dry food coming. From looking at this forum I've seen many people suggest it as a dry option for those in the UK like myself but my main question is regarding her wet food as she will not eat dry without wet or vice versa because she is very fussy, now I've found some very good wet foods that are simply outside of my budget and I know that many cheap wet foods while have a very low carb content which is obvious what in looking for they tend to use less that stellar meat sources.

Should I prioritise the carb content over the source of meat (IE meat and animal derivatives) if it's only being used as a topper to her dry food.

 

[Sienne and Gabby (GA)]

Welcome to FDMB.

This is a link to a food list for our UK members. I'm also tagging one of our members who is in the UK. @Elizabeth and Bertie. Canned food is better for a few reasons. You want to be feeding your cat a low carbohydrate diet. We consider low carb as under 10% carb although most of our members feed their cat a diet that's in the vicinity of 5%. Most dry food is much higher in carbs. There are also cat food carbohydrate calculators on the web so you can figure out the carb count of foods that aren't listed. The other reason that canned food is preferred is that cats have a limited thirst drive. There is very little moisture content in dry food whereas canned foods are very high in moisture. The moisture content is particularly important with diabetic cats. Diabetes is hard on the kidneys. Making sure your cat is well hydrated helps to prevent premature kidney damage.

Also, just so you are aware, Caninsulin is not a great choice of insulin for cats. As you can tell from the name, it was developed for dogs. Prozinc is a far better option and is available in the UK for treating feline diabetes.

 

[Edington]

Welcome to FDMB.

This is a link to a food list for our UK members. I'm also tagging one of our members who is in the UK. @Elizabeth and Bertie. Canned food is better for a few reasons. You want to be feeding your cat a low carbohydrate diet. We consider low carb as under 10% carb although most of our members feed their cat a diet that's in the vicinity of 5%. Most dry food is much higher in carbs. There are also cat food carbohydrate calculators on the web so you can figure out the carb count of foods that aren't listed. The other reason that canned food is preferred is that cats have a limited thirst drive. There is very little moisture content in dry food whereas canned foods are very high in moisture. The moisture content is particularly important with diabetic cats. Diabetes is hard on the kidneys. Making sure your cat is well hydrated helps to prevent premature kidney damage.

Also, just so you are aware, Caninsulin is not a great choice of insulin for cats. As you can tell from the name, it was developed for dogs. Prozinc is a far better option and is available in the UK for treating feline diabetes.

Thank you for the reply I have seen some other posts about the differences between Caninsulin and Prozinc is this something I should bring up to my vet? Ultimately they are the ones that's going to have the last call on which medication is used as it's prescription only.

The Thrive Dry food has a carb content of around 9% and I've been advised by another long time diabetic cat owner that her cats do well and it's also much better than the ones I'm currently feeding as that has a whopping 40+% though I will take a look at the list you provided so thank you for that.

What do I do about the actual quality of the food though should I be prioritising the carbohydrate contents even if that means lowering my standards when in comes to the protein and fat ingredients. For example there is a wet food in my local pet store that has a carb content of 2% but the protein ingredients just lists animal derivatives of which 4% is chicken while there is another that has a good protein ingredients like 38 % chicken but the carb content is slightly higher at 8%.

 

[Sienne and Gabby (GA)]

I'm going to link a website on feline nutrition. The site is authored by a vet. She does provide some discussion regarding the quality of a cat's diet and leans toward being attentive to feeding muscle meat.

I don't know that there's one good answer to your question. I think if we were all independently wealthy, it would be easy to say feed your cat the best quality food possible. The reality is that most people juggle quality (i.e., muscle meat vs animal by products) vs carbohydrates vs cost. For a diabetic, carbs are in my mind, the biggest issue. If you're feeding a high quality, high carb food, there's little chance that your cat will go into remission. The higher the carbs, the more insulin will be needed to offset the carb load. You may be able to tightly regulate your cat, but remission is unlikely. Even for cats that go into remission, it's helpful to realize that they are diet controlled diabetics. If you return them to a high carb diet, there's a good chance your cat will be back on insulin.

The issue with carbs is also that 1% carb may not be a good food for YOUR cat -- or it may be what your cat needs. Some cats are exquisitely sensitive to carbs and some are less so. It may be a matter of trial and error to find out what works best for your cat. We have a saying here, ECID -- every cat is different. And don't be surprised if you find a food your cat loves and by next week, refuses to eat it. They tend to like to be unpredictable!

Many of us feed our cat a raw diet. At least in the US, there are "pre-mixes" which make preparing a raw diet easy. These are powders that contain all of the supplements necessary to make a raw diet nutritionally complete. I don't know if there's something equivalent in the UK. I don't know if a raw diet would be more or less costly than what you're currently feeding your cat. There are also freeze dried and air dried raw foods (e.g., ZiwiPeak). Those may be options to consider, as well.

If you're planning on discussing insulin with your vet, this is a link to the guidelines for treating diabetes from the American Animal Hospital Assn. They note the issues with Caninsulin (it's called Vetsulin in the US). It may be helpful to bring it along to your vet. It's only been relatively recently that vets in the UK could prescribe Prozinc as a first line insulin. Your vet may be more comfortable with Caninsulin despite it being a better insulin for cats.

 

[Edington]

I'm going to link a website on feline nutrition. The site is authored by a vet. She does provide some discussion regarding the quality of a cat's diet and leans toward being attentive to feeding muscle meat.

I don't know that there's one good answer to your question. I think if we were all independently wealthy, it would be easy to say feed your cat the best quality food possible. The reality is that most people juggle quality (i.e., muscle meat vs animal by products) vs carbohydrates vs cost. For a diabetic, carbs are in my mind, the biggest issue. If you're feeding a high quality, high carb food, there's little chance that your cat will go into remission. The higher the carbs, the more insulin will be needed to offset the carb load. You may be able to tightly regulate your cat, but remission is unlikely. Even for cats that go into remission, it's helpful to realize that they are diet controlled diabetics. If you return them to a high carb diet, there's a good chance your cat will be back on insulin.

The issue with carbs is also that 1% carb may not be a good food for YOUR cat -- or it may be what your cat needs. Some cats are exquisitely sensitive to carbs and some are less so. It may be a matter of trial and error to find out what works best for your cat. We have a saying here, ECID -- every cat is different. And don't be surprised if you find a food your cat loves and by next week, refuses to eat it. They tend to like to be unpredictable!

Many of us feed our cat a raw diet. At least in the US, there are "pre-mixes" which make preparing a raw diet easy. These are powders that contain all of the supplements necessary to make a raw diet nutritionally complete. I don't know if there's something equivalent in the UK. I don't know if a raw diet would be more or less costly than what you're currently feeding your cat. There are also freeze dried and air dried raw foods (e.g., ZiwiPeak). Those may be options to consider, as well.

If you're planning on discussing insulin with your vet, this is a link to the guidelines for treating diabetes from the American Animal Hospital Assn. They note the issues with Caninsulin (it's called Vetsulin in the US). It may be helpful to bring it along to your vet. It's only been relatively recently that vets in the UK could prescribe Prozinc as a first line insulin. Your vet may be more comfortable with Caninsulin despite it being a better insulin for cats.

Thanks for your input She was actually fed a raw diet from a very early age that i formulated and managed myself (before my current career I studied Animal management for 4 years though it was some time ago and I no longer have access to my notes and other resources),it wasn't until she was around 4-5 years old that I had to stop the diet and that was due to my working hours being doubled so finding the time to prepare, freeze and defrost on a daily basis was very difficult and with my current living conditions and the price of her medication I'm essentially limited to £50 per month for her food

I will definitely speak them when I go in for another appointment as her next one is on Tuesday to check her curve and how she is reacting to the increase in medication. Her original results where really high as it was around 34 mmol/l at it's highest but after her initial doses of 1 unit that number dropped to 13 mmol/l at it's lowest to 25 mmol/l at it's highest which is why they recommend going to 2 unit injections though it could also be the carb content in her food because as I said earlier she's on a food right now that has 40% carbs but her new food should arrive in a few days, I'm yet to buy an at home Glucometer unfortunately so the vets is the only way to test until I can find one.