Recently diagnosed cat. Need advice on food.

Status
Not open for further replies.
S

Simkie

New Member
Isabel is a 6 year old Manx. She was taken to the vet after an episode of peeing while asleep on a lap.

No infection seen, no crystals in urine, kidney function fine on blood work. Urinary glucose was high (250) as was blood glucose (245)...sorry, do not have units.

Isabel is currently eating California Natural Venison and Brown Rice, with some added H2O: http://www.californianaturalpet.com/pro ... sp?id=1010 She has been on this diet for about a year. Prior to that, she was on Innova dry food (since kitten-hood). She had gotten obese on the dry food and has slimmed down to normal to lean on the wet.

I would not expect to see diabetes on this diet. I know the next step is to switch to something with no grain...which made more difficult because she also lives with a cat with some odd allergies. I'm eyeballing this: http://www.evopet.com/products/default.asp?id=1498 which seems like it meets the requirements.

Any thoughts on the EVO or the diet she's on now? Thanks for any thoughts. I'm a bit blind-sided by this...did not expect with Cal Nat!
 
Well, at least her glucose isn't sky high. Too high but not sky high.

Have you reviewed all the food data at Janet & Binky's page? How about Dr. Lisa's page?

Isabel is pretty young, looks like early in the course of the diabetes, so I bet you can make some minor diet improvements, maybe treat with Lantus or Levemir for awhile, and get her in remission.

There are lots of people on this board with better knowledge about diets than me and I am sure they will be along soon.

Glad you found us!
 
Does Isabel have an infection? Does she need dental work? I ask because infections can raise blood glucose, vet stress can raise blood glucose and we see so many cats that need dental work, they improve dramatically after it is done. So I have some doubt as to Isabel's diabetes diagnosis.

Please take the time to read our FAQs and the links in the Health Links section of this board. The more you know about feline diabetes the easier it will be to discuss your course of action with your vet.

Gia & Quirk

Guilt trips are a detour from life
 
Nope, no infection. No abnormal white count. Teeth are fantastic. Absolutely no need for a dental.

I might have expected--or at least, not have been surprised--of a diabetes diagnosis when she was FAT, but she slimmed down very nicely on the wet. Her weight loss was gradual and healthy. She's now a svelte 9 lbs kitty, down from 13 a year ago.

I've been all over catinfo.org, and it's one of the reasons I switched my kitty cats to wet only. Knew I'd seen Janet's tables, but couldn't find them again--thank you for that link. Looks like what she's on now is 15% cals from carbs. The EVO is only 2%, so will work to get her on that. Surprised that 15% would set her off, but guess it is what it is. Can't imagine if she was in a house that just fed dry Cat Chow!

Vet has requested we use strips in the litter box for the next week to rule stress-induced high glucose readings. Perhaps that's all it is--she did travel about 45 minutes to the vet. That would be an easy answer!
 
Jen & Squeak said:
a fructosamine blood test is a much more valid way to diagnose....
Click to expand...

Getting to the vet involves a 45-60 minute car ride one way and a half day off of work. Considering that her levels are not sky high and the vet does not consider this a crisis, is retesting warranted?
 
Assuming that the 250 was at the vet. If so, it may be that her numbers at home would be much lower, perhaps out of the diabetic range. If I were you, I would get a glucometer and start testing her levels at home. Are you seeing other symptoms of diabetes? Is she loading up the litter box? hanging out by the water bowl? really hungry?

Maybe there is another answer to her peeing on the lap. It would be fairly easy to find out if her bg levels are in the diabetic range at home. If not, maybe there is something else going on. Are you sure there is no Urinary Tract infection? What test did the vet use?
 
Yep, 250 was at the vet. Urine was obtained via cystocentesis and showed no abnormalities besides the high glucose. The litter box is quite wet, but not unusually so--water is added to all kitties wet food to "soup." None of them are ever seen at the water bucket. Hard to tell if she's "really hungry"...she's a manx ;) According to her she's ALWAYS STARVING! But her appetite hasn't changed. She's fed twice a day.

Before pulling urine the vet suggested she might have some sort of bladder control issue related to her being a manx. I thought it odd that he would suggest for a couple reasons--she's got a tail, which seems to preclude the manx bowel and bladder control issues (um, I think? A bit hard to tell from my googling), and I'd also expect something to show before now if that was the case.
 
Welcome... I had a manx who had a little nub tail... she looked like a wee black bear. She was only 6 lbs at her heaviest. She never had any trouble with going to the bathroom... I've never heard of that issue before.

Oddly, my manx, Muph did have inappropriate elimination issues one year. She was peeing on the phone table. As it turned out, it was flees... but there was not a flea to be found on any furniture or anything... only on her. My father wanted to have her PTS and was convinced the lump on her rump was a tumor.... yeesh. Thank goodness we had her examined. Just fleas... a horrible bout of fleas. I'm not saying that's what's going on with yours... but if it's continuous, more investigation is needed.
 
Hmmm. Interesting idea about the fleas. Doubt that's what's going on--pretty much unheard of in CO--but might as well take a look.

Oh, and realized my "she's got a tail" might have been confusing. A manx with a tail? ;) She's got about an inch. Wiki talks about that manx thing: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manx_%28cat%29 And according to the classifications there, she'd be a "rumpy."
 
My Muph was a riser I suppose... just enough of a tiny stub that she could balance when she sat on her bum. She looked like a tiny bear. She was a long-haired black manx. She had four kittens in one litter and only the two without tails lived. She had them while we were away camping and we wondered if she thought the ones with the tails were deformed or something and that's why she didn't clean them or keep them alive... or maybe they were still-born. We don't know.

And it might not be fleas... but something could be affecting her and her stress level to raise her BG.
 
Assume CO stands for Colorado. We are in the Springs. We have a number of members in Arvada and Denver, if you need help for vet ideas at some point. True, fleas are not usually a problem here......
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top