Newly Diagnosed Cat

[hold short]

Our cat Mister was recently diagnosed with Diabetes. It was about 3 weeks ago we noticed an increase in volume of urine so we decided to take him into the vet.

After running a BG test he came back at 357 initially. This indicated diabetes. We wanted to be sure so we then ran the fructosamine test. That indicated a higher level of 481. So, now we got prescribed insulin to give him 1 unit every 12 hours.

However, we would like to change his diet. Unfortunately, so we don't rock the boat too much we are going to have to wait so he doesn't get too stressed. Hopefully, once we have settled into the routine (a month or so) we can then slowly switch him over to a better food. Right now he is on I/D. We have been on it for about 3.5 years due to pancreatitis. We have been lucky that he has only had one flare up since 2015. But, I think we realized the food we have him on has slowly lead us down the road to diabetes. Now, we are looking for the right food to help both pancreatitis and diabetes. We'd like to avoid a flare up and keep his diabetes in check.

 

[Idjit's mom]

Hi and welcome to FDMB. You have come to the right place to learn more about feline diabetes and treatment. I am so sorry that Mister had the bad experience of pancreatitis, and I agree that you don't want to ever revisit that again. Are you home testing at this point? Home testing is the best tool you have to keep Mister safe and to see the effects of insulin and any diet change you make. I see that you have posted in the Main Health forum already, super! Please take a look at the FAQs forum, and go through the Index for more information, particularly the Food / Feeding and Hometesting and Blood Glucose Meters sections.
Many of us had to transition our sugar cats to a low carb wet diet and eliminate the dry food, with sometimes dramatic effects. Home testing is going to help you prevent any Hypo events, or let you know something is happening so you can take action, as moving Mister to a better diet may significantly lower his blood sugar. I would not wait a month to change his diet, feeding the dry food (or even a high carb wet food) is not going to help lower his blood sugar and you just have a defeating cycle going on with high carbs going in and insulin to counter effect.
There is a wonderful feline nutrition site by Dr. Lisa Pierson (who compiled the food chart found at the top of the Main Health forum) www.catinfo.org. Dr. Pierson suggests a wet diet 10% carb or less. The food chart gives protein, fat, carbs, phosphorus and calories amounts.
It would be very helpful if you would create your signature so that Mister's pertinent info is available when you post, here's how: SIGNATURE
Best wishes going forward.

 

[hold short]

Thanks for the info. I updated my signature and will begin a transition to a new food. We started home testing last night. At least we can monitor his BG much closer and hopefully reduce his numbers long term.

 

[Idjit's mom]

Wonderful that you will be home testing, here are the SPREADSHEET instructions and how to understand the GRID. Please start posting in the Main Health forum HERE with general health and care questions, and take a look at the Vetsulin specific forum for information on using that insulin, and get input from Vetsulin users. I'm looking forward to seeing a picture of Mister and following your progress.