IBD and diabetes how do you deal with it?

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dana moore

dana moore

Member Since 2015
My cat Riley was just diagnosed with diabetes he was diagnosed with IBD 6 months ago and has been on a steroid shot depo. He gets that every 30 days and the vet said he believes that the steroids is what caused the diabetes. Now I'm concerned with all the medication he's taking on top of all these health issues. Right now he's taking Baytril one milliliter daily for 21 days for UTI. And he's been taking for the past 6 months 1 milliliter twice a week of azrithromycin. I guess this is to help control the bacteria levels. I did have him on a probiotic as well I stopped giving it to him 3 weeks ago because the doctor wasn't sure if it was ok to take with diabetes although the antibiotic has sugar in it!!! Doesn't make any sense.
 
I started giving him his probiotics back yesterday because I noticed he was constipated and I just gave him some pure pumpkin hopefully to help.
 
I would recommend you sign up for the yahoo Feline IBD mailing list and forum; there is a lot of good information. You might ask your vet about Miralax for constipation, in case the pumpkin doesn't work for your kitty. Is he getting enough water with his food?
 
Greetings and welcome to a fellow IBD/Diabetic cat mom! I have one of those myself!

dana moore said:
My cat Riley was just diagnosed with diabetes he was diagnosed with IBD 6 months ago and has been on a steroid shot depo. He gets that every 30 days and the vet said he believes that the steroids is what caused the diabetes.
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Skooter was dx'd with IBD several years ago and the diabetes was last April. My vet also thinks the steroids are what did him in, though he was not always on the steroid. Once he was dx'd with diabetes, we stopped the pred and actually changed to budesonide, so I would check with your vet and see if that is an option. I get my compounded as a liquid and shipped to me. He gets the chicken flavor, but make sure there is no sugar in the compound and/or flavoring they are using as that will cause the BG to jump up for sure.

dana moore said:
Now I'm concerned with all the medication he's taking on top of all these health issues. Right now he's taking Baytril one milliliter daily for 21 days for UTI. And he's been taking for the past 6 months 1 milliliter twice a week of azrithromycin.
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There are others far smarter than I on this topic, however I would wonder if they did a urine culture to see what kind of bacteria they are dealing with to make sure they are using the most appropriate antibiotic for him. It is possible that he may have built up a tolerance to the azrithromycin and it may not be effective. Again, I am not great with advice on antibiotics, so I will leave that one for others to ponder. It's not a bad idea to take stock of what meds he is on and see if they are the best with the diabetes dx, there may be alternatives that you could use instead. But sometimes it comes down to treating the other conditions first and then working the diabetes treatment in with that. But again, I leave this kind of medication stuff to the "pros."

dana moore said:
I did have him on a probiotic as well I stopped giving it to him 3 weeks ago because the doctor wasn't sure if it was ok to take with diabetes although the antibiotic has sugar in it!!! Doesn't make any sense.
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Skooter takes a probiotic. He gets half a pill in the second meal of each insulin feeding cycle (every 12 hours). Nexbiotic was what was recommended to me by the FB IBD support group I belong to, many of them also have experience with diabetes as well. When they made the recommendation, they were aware of his diabetes as well. Knock on wood, I honestly couldn't tell you the last time Skooter had a flare (which normally involves vomit).

A little additional info on my guy :) He is 18, he was on a rx dry food and up to 5 units of insulin twice a day when we were getting started. With the help of everyone here, I started to transition him SLOWLY to a wet food (didn't want to upset the IBD!). When we were doing 1/2 and 1/2 of wet and dry, we went to 4 units twice a day. When he was fully transitioned to wet we dropped to 2 units a day...the full transition happened last July. Today, he is on a DROP of insulin (0.10) twice a day with beautiful numbers almost always in the normal range of 50 - 120. His insulin of choice is Lantus and he eats Nature's Variety Chicken. Eventually I would like to get him on a commercial raw diet, but life is really crazy right now, so that will have to wait.


dana moore said:
I started giving him his probiotics back yesterday because I noticed he was constipated and I just gave him some pure pumpkin hopefully to help.
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Skooter recently went through a bad bout of constipation and would not touch the pumpkin or squash. He actually ended up with two enemas to get cleared out. He is now a lifer on 1/8 teaspoon of miralax, given in the first meal of each insulin food cycle. I would definitely check with your vet before starting miralax, Skooter started it based on an ER vet recommendation and when we had our follow up appointment with is regular vet we decided to keep him on it.

So I have probably overwhelmed you with info as it is, but just know there is a WEALTH of information on this board. Ask as many questions as you need, ask for clarification or something explained a different way if need be.
 
Molly, how often does he takebutdesonide? And how much? They also found Cyclospuridium in his feces he was on azrithromycin for like six weeks straight. This was before he was diagnosed with IBD. It was horribpr
 
@dana moore Sorry I have been away for a bit....Skooter gets a liquid version and it is .5mL each morning.....

There is a suspension with it too and I can't remember that off the top of my head
 
Another option for the budesonide is have it compounded into pills. I get mine from Roadrunner Pharmacy. Mischief takes them daily and loves the flavor of them. I just crush it up on top of her food.
 
Thank you everyone we are switching Riely to Budesonide if he needs it. I'm hoping soft food helps with IBD
 
Budesonide is good for IBD. My civie cat has been on it for several years. Changing to a wet food is very helpful.

@MollynSkooter Which FB IBD group do you belong to? The only one I can find was one about IBD cats and raw foods.
 
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@Cat Ma I belong to that one, but they are a great resource, even if you are not feeding raw, as Skooter is not on a raw diet of yet, but they are a great source of knowledge and support. The other one I think it called IBDKitties but I think a lot of the same people are on each of those.
 
Please help me people I need to order some budesonide my vet says he can't get it and I need to prove him wrong and get it. Riley is starting to get diarrhea again.
 
Forti flora is very good for diarrhea. So is plain canned pumpkin. If diarrhea persists, metronidazole from the vet may be helpful. But your vet would need to assess why your cat is having diarrhea.
 
That is the one I gave Dana. And I just placed my order with them. Thank you Larry & Kitties.
 
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I called and left a message with the company so hopefully they will call me back soon,thank you so much. Should I call my vet and tell him to fax them a prescription? And then they will send it to my house?
 
It takes about a week. I ordered on the 22nd and expect it to arrive to my home tomorrow. You can put a rush on your order but it costs more. You can have Thriving Pets contact your vet to fax them the RX. It's really simple. The first step would be to place an order online.
 
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Fortiflora didn't help with my cat's diarrhea but I've read that this is an option for IBD kitties: Animal Essentials Plant Enzymes & Probiotics. Available from chewy.com and probably some other places. I'm going to try it on Marshmallow.

http://www.chewy.com/cat/animal-essentials-plant-enzymes/dp/49372

If Roadrunner takes too long, maybe call another vet office and ask if they'll dispense it to you if you get a scrip from your vet.

Good luck.
 
Thriving Pets does offer overnight delivery for an additional fee. It costs more but would probably save you the hassle of trying to find a compounding pet pharmacy or another vet willing to fill the budesonide.
 
@granadilla Let us know how the Animal Essentials Plant Enzymes & Probiotics works for Marshmallow. Bonnie still craves Forti Flora and it's been helping her.
How is Marshmallow doing?
 
I filled out all my information online and then I went to submit it and it kept telling me I wasn't putting in enough information and there's nothing else I could do so I just gave up I'm waiting for them to call me
 
You need to add in your pet's name and info and press save. Then add in your vet's info and press save. It was a little tricky for me at first, too.
 
I'm only able to use my cell phone and I don't have a save button like my computer or do I? I'm new to this cell phone
 
Under Prescription Info, you need to add new pet, fill in your pet's info then press "save pet". Same thing with vet info--put in all the vet data and then press "save vet". Once you enter all the info, then you just go back and select pet and it will bring up your cat's info and select vet and it will bring up your vet info so it propagates to your order. Hope this makes sense.
 
You need to add your vet info in. It couldn't find my vet either. You're on the right track. Once you input the info, you won't have to re-input it again for refills.
 
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I finally figured it out thank you so much I ordered it and we'll see. I paid an extra $13 for 2 day shipping. So you only give one milligram once today? Or is it every other day?
 
Glad it finally worked! Bonnie is on 1 mg daily. Bonnie isn't a sugar cat. If I skip a day, Bonnie has less of an appetite and vomits. She also gets weekly B12 injections, which is good for IBD.
 
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Riley's just had diarrhea really bad. I guess the vomiting is small intestines and for diarrhea I think its the large intestines that are inflamed? I almost feel like my vet is ignoring me because I brought all of this information from our website about diabetes and I think that he thinks I'm a know it all. Idk it just seems like now their kind of blowing me off.
 
He told me to let him know if Riley got diarrhea after the injection were off and I called Tuesday of last week and they said it was going to be in Friday and I never heard from them so I left a message this morning and they still didn't call me back then I decided to call at 555 when they close and they said that they can't get it from their pharmacy. Don't you think they should have called me and told me that a long time ago knowing that Riley had diarrhea?
 
No, I think they should have called. If they continue to blow you off, it might be time to shop for a new vet. Even if you have a good relationship with the vet, it can make it impossible when the front desk staff don't return calls or treat you well.

I've heard the same thing about vomiting being small intestines and pooping problems are the colon. Did you try pumpkin for the diarrhea? Sorry if I missed that. You could also try yogurt for the probiotics, or oatmeal for the fiber (works like pumpkin does). Marshmallow spat out the oatmeal but she likes pumpkin and it works for her.

@Cat Ma, thanks for asking. I need to find a different novel protein that will work for her. She didn't seem to get anything out of the S&C. :( She likes the taste of Fortiflora but it hasn't seemed to help her IBD. She's not bad though: the Budesonide stopped all the rumbling sounds I was hearing from her stomach and she hasn't puked since she started it. She's having chronic constipation so I'm also starting her on Miralax. I've heard great things about this enzyme/probiotic so I'll keep you posted!
 
Diarrhoea can be caused by problems in the small intestine as well. I did have a poop checker reference, but I can't find it. Vomiting can be caused by problems in the stomach, the intestines, or constipation.

Probiotics can help, as I'm sure you know. I do feel for you, Dana. Saoirse had diarrhoea for the first time ever last year when she had a major pancreatitis flare: it went on for weeks. I feared I might never see a solid poop from her ever again ... :( (FWIW, I think carrageenan may have been the trigger.)

One thing that helped Saoirse's poops to firm up a bit was Pro-Kolin (kaolin-based paste with probiotics).
 
Bonnie has both diarrhea and vomiting, common with her IBD issues. But it is also common with pancreatitis and so many other issues in cats.

@Dana, call your vet first thing in the morning about the diarrhea. There could be something else going on. The vet should be telling you what the problem is, not leaving it up to you to figure it out. But it's good that you're bringing up concerns to the vet. That shows you are a responsible owner.

Is the poop foul smellling? Constant? Watch out for dehydration. Check and make sure the gums aren't tacky. Pinch up the nape. If it tents and stays up, the cat is dehydrated. If dehydrated, force down fluids with unflavored pedialyte and notify the vet. Bonnie had a bad episode with diarrhea recently and ended up needing fluids from the vet.

@granadilla, glad to hear the budesonide is helping Marshmallow. Try venison, rabbit, lamb, etc. Something she hasn't had before. Introduce it slowly. Hope the Miralax helps.
 
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