Help with caloric intake

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wendygirl

Member Since 2023
Hi, my name is Gwendolyn and I am new here. My cat Bruno has diabetes and is currently eating Purina dry food in the blue bag. From what I can gather, he is eating 3/4 cup per day which is 303 calories per day. I want to switch to fancy Feast pate which he is showing a little interest in eating.

Here is where I am confused. Dr Lisa Pierson advises that most cats inly need 4-6 ounces of wet food per day. Purina says that a 3 ounce can of FF pate has 91 calories and that it feeds 3-3.5lbs of weight. So doing the math, I come up with a 12-14 pound cat needing about 4 cans of FF- or 12 ounces of FF pate per day. It also says on their website under the nutrition values that it contains minimum of 10% protein. That seems very low. Food Nation's food chart lists it as 40% protein. So I am very confused as to if he should even eat Fancy Feast and how much. But I have tried other wet foods and this is the one he is at least trying.

He is also on 3 units of Lantus 2x a day. I understand he will need to cut his insulin down if he transitions to wet/low carb. Can I take a glucose reading after he eats to see if he needs insulin? I am assuming that is how a diabetic person manages their diabetes?

Thank you for your help. It is much appreciated.
 
Welcome to FDMB!

There are different methods for analyzing the nutritional content of food. It depends on which method you're looking at and if the other lists you've seen are using a different method.

You will want to slowly transition from the high carb, dry food to the lower carb canned food. You won't know just how much to change the dose so a slow transition is best for two reasons. The first is due to the carb change -- just as you noted. The other reason is that for many cats, an abrupt change in diet can cause a GI upset. Dr. Pierson's website has information on transitioning a cat from dry to canned food.

Also, with Lantus, you want to test your cat's blood glucose level before you give a shot. If you're shooting after Bruno has eaten, the numbers will be influenced by food. In addition, if you don't test before giving insulin, you don't know if Bruno is in safe numbers to warrant giving insulin. Lantus typically doesn't start working for about 2 hours.

Gwendolyn - if you are planning on sticking around, you may want to take a look at this post on helping us to help you. It provides instructions on getting your signature set up so we don't keep asking you the same questions as well as how to set up a spreadsheet so you can track Bruno's progress and we can follow along.

Please let us know how we can help.
 
wendygirl said:
Hi, my name is Gwendolyn and I am new here. My cat Bruno has diabetes and is currently eating Purina dry food in the blue bag. From what I can gather, he is eating 3/4 cup per day which is 303 calories per day. I want to switch to fancy Feast pate which he is showing a little interest in eating.

Here is where I am confused. Dr Lisa Pierson advises that most cats inly need 4-6 ounces of wet food per day. Purina says that a 3 ounce can of FF pate has 91 calories and that it feeds 3-3.5lbs of weight. So doing the math, I come up with a 12-14 pound cat needing about 4 cans of FF- or 12 ounces of FF pate per day. It also says on their website under the nutrition values that it contains minimum of 10% protein. That seems very low. Food Nation's food chart lists it as 40% protein. So I am very confused as to if he should even eat Fancy Feast and how much. But I have tried other wet foods and this is the one he is at least trying.
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Hi Gwendolyn and Bruno. You are not alone with the confusion over foods and how nutritional values are portayed on the cans, websites and in the lists. You probably did read that some companies will list minimums (say for protein, fat, etc,) and others will use a maximums for these same things. Also these numbers can be misleading and seem to contradict eachother depending on where you look for the info. There are also several ways of calculating nutritional values, (Guaranteed Analysis, Caloric Weight Basis, and Dry Matter Basis, also the term "as fed" is used. ) It's kinda crazy and can be overwhelming to figure out.
2nd thing, when you consider calories you need to consider not only the weight of your kitty, but also his "ideal weight" and base daily calorie consumption on these 2 things, keeping in mind that if Bruno has maintained a good weight (close to ideal) on 300 calories a day up to this point, then this is perfectly fine to continue. If weight loss is the goal, then a slow drop in total caloric intake is required, underweight?... increase calories.
(I am guessing newly diagnosed he may have lost some weight, and is also very very hungry.) You do need to keep him fed!!!!! There is much help here and a priority is to get the Diabetes under control and slowly transition to the low carb wet food only diet.
Many members here have success with the FF pates, because they are low carb, and carbs play a huge part in regulating Diabetes. ;)
Welcome!!!! Ask questions! stick around and set up your info! You will get answers to all your questions. :bighug:
 
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