Should I be concerned?

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Kerflumper

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What are the long term affects of elevated blood sugar in cats? My cat is stuck at 300 and I haven't had any luck getting her sugar down. The vet seems to think that this is acceptable as long as she's eating well and her weight is good. My concern is what the long term affect will be. Also with this level, she's drinking a lot and peeing a lot. I'm cleaning about 10 lb of clumped litter from her box daily.
 
Hi, and welcome!

Couple questions...
What insulin is she on, and what's the dose?
What kind of food is she eating?
Are you home testing, and are those 300's at shot time, or all day/night long?

One thing that worked for me on the litter (they will pee a lot until their numbers start to improve) was switching to pine and corn based litters. They are a little more expensive off the shelf, but require less scooping than clay. Two I use are World's Best and Feline Pine.

Carl
 
Kerflumper said:
What are the long term affects of elevated blood sugar in cats? My cat is stuck at 300 and I haven't had any luck getting her sugar down. The vet seems to think that this is acceptable as long as she's eating well and her weight is good. My concern is what the long term affect will be. Also with this level, she's drinking a lot and peeing a lot. I'm cleaning about 10 lb of clumped litter from her box daily.
Click to expand...

Long term high blood glucose is damaging to various organs. We do not consider it acceptable for a cat to run in the 300s.

There are several factors which contribute to high blood glucose. For example, if you are still feeding dry food or are feeding a food with a lot of grains in it, even if it's canned, it can contribute to higher BGs. Low carb canned food is better than every prescription food out there for diabetic cats, despite what the vet may have told you about what to feed. If you've been feeding the prescription food, take it back and get a refund. There are canned foods you can get at any pet store which have better quality ingredients and are lower in carbohydrates, such as Wellness brand or EVO brand. Just like with human diabetics, diet is very important for diabetic cats. We regularly recommend the classic varieties of Fancy Feast even!

If you can answer the questions Carl asked, we can help you further. If treated properly with insulin and put on a low carb diet, some cats can go in to remission.
 
Long term high blood sugars can cause a lot of health issues/side effects.
The main ones are:
Nerve damage / diabetic neuropathy.
Leaking/brittleness in the small blood vessels that cause eye and kidney issues
More likely to get infections

Mary's original owner got bad advice from their vet and she averaged ~400 for 18 months. She's got diabetic neuropathy that has caused Mary's funny walk.

The good news is that with the right food and insulin and learning to home test you should be able to get your cats sugars much closer to the normal range. Many cats can go into remission where their pancreas recovers enough so their diabetes is controlled just by diet.

Answer the questions the previous poster asked and people will be able to guide you in thd right direction
 
Thanks for the quick replies. She's on Prozinc; 3 units twice a day. We had gone as high as 5 but saw no improvement. She's eating Hill's W/D wet and dry. She eats about a cup a day of the dry and one can of the wet. We're not home testing. The vet says that home testing can be very inaccurate and we should go based on her symptoms rather than spending money to bring her in for tests. I think peeing so much is an important symptom - the most frustrating anyway.
 
Vet testing can be very inaccurate due to the stress levels of your cat, home testing is much more accurate. Leaving kitty in the 300s will absolutely shorten her life due to damage to her organs, particularly kidneys. Most vets don't seem to be up to date with appropriate treatments for FD and yours seems to be no different. Suggest you start home testing (seems freaky but not so difficult once you get started) ASAP and the results will soon tell us what is the best way forward for your cat.
 
Is there a step-by-step guide for new home testers? What about changing food? Is there something better than what I'm using?
 
First, start the home testing. Here is a great video: Video for hometesting and a shopping list:

A human glucometer. Any one that sips and takes a tiny sample is fine. We do stay away from any meter with True in the name and the Freestyle meters. They have proven to be very unreliable and read lower than other meters. The meters are often free at drug stores; it’s the strips that are expensive. You can, however, buy them on ebay at less than half the price of stores. Lots of people here also like the ReliOn from Walmart. It is an inexpensive meter and its strips are the cheapest around. Try the meter out on yourself or someone else before you try it on your cat. You want to be familiar with it before you poke the cat.

Lancets and a lancet device. Usually, until the ears “learn” to bleed, a 26-28 gauge is good. Any brand will work as long as the lancets match your device.

Ketone strips. (Ketostix) Just like human diabetics use. You will sometimes need to test urine if the numbers are high.

Rice sack. Make this out of thinnish sock, filled with raw rice or oatmeal and then knotted. You heat this in the microwave until very warm but not hot. Then heat the ears before poking. You can also use a prescription bottle filled with very warm water. It provides a good surface to poke against.

Also nice to have. Flashlight: so you can look at the ears and find the little capillaries that come off the vein running down the ear. Vaseline: Put a tiny smear where you want to poke. It will help the blood bead up.

And some lo carb treats to give your kitty, successful test or not Lo carb treats

It doesn't always work the first time; we spent a whole weekend poking poor Oliver and not getting a drop - heating the ear long enough and using the right gauge lancet was the trick for us. Try it and let us know if we can help with advice/tips

Once you have the testing down, then pull all the dry food. When we switched Oliver over to all wet, he dropped 100 points overnight. (If we hadn't been testing and had just shot the usual amount, he would have hypoed. That's why the testing comes first.) Have you seen this website by a vet explaining why wet food is best: www.catinfo.org
 
Some cats like it once it gets a little crusty, but there are concerns if the weather is warm or if you are in an area with lots of insects. Many of us freeze the wet food. I use a silicone cupcake pan. A can of Fancy Feast fits perfectly into each cup. I freeze it for a few hours, then pop out the pucks and put them back in the freezer in a freezer plastic bag. I also love my PetSafe5 automatic feeder. I put in a frozen puck and set it to open when I would like him to eat.

Though in my case, the cat doesn't leave any food to go bad. :mrgreen: he is a gulper, not a grazer.
 
Hills is not one of the lowest carb foods and it is more expensive with ingredients that are no better than OTC foods. Lots of us who need lower cost low carb feed Fancy Feast or Friskies - the classic flavors for FF, the pate flavors for Friskies. Yes, they have byproducts, but I figure, so do mice. Nine lives is fine also. We try to stay below the 8-10% carb level.
 
mocha eat's wal marts special kitty .. it fit into our budget easier then FF .. the cans are larger 5.5 vs 3.5 (I believe) and they are cheaper at .43 ... she LOVES the turkey and giblet flavor, and I believe that is around 4% ..
 
9 Lives is fine :smile:

Here are additional food lists/charts:

Pet Food Nutritional Values list
Hobo's Guide To Nutritional Values
Dr. Lynne's Wet Food list
List of low carb gluten free Fancy Feast

On the Pet Food Nutritional Values Chart and Hobo's Guide, look at the %kcal from carbs column and choose foods that have a number 10 or less.

Kerflumper said:
My concern with switching to all wet food is leaving it out all day. Doesn't it go bad?
Click to expand...

There are various ways to keep the food from spoiling too quickly. Most people use a timed feeder. Some feeders have ice packs to keep the food cool. Some people just freeze the food into small chunks and put the frozen chunks into the feeder bowl to slowly defrost. For a mutli-compartment feeder, it's a good idea to have the first meal or two as fresh canned and the later meals as frozen. That way your cat has ready to eat meals right away and the frozen ones will have time to slowly thaw. Any leftover food should be thrown away at the end of the day.
 
Kerflumper said:
Am I reading the following chart wrong? It appears that Hill's W/D has much more carbs than many others. Can I just go with 9-Lives? http://binkyspage.tripod.com/CanFoodNew.html
Click to expand...

Exactly right, Hill's food, in general, is very inappropriate for a diabetic cat. The "M/D" is supposed to be for diabetics, but it's too high in carbs too. 9-Lives makes several flavors that are good, as do Friskees (pates) and Fancy Feast (classics). Not only will you give her a much better diet, but you'll save a ton of money too. :smile:
And fantastic that you've decided to home test. Your vet isn't right about it not being accurate. Are the numbers you get at home going to be as "accurate" as the ones he charges you for? Yes and no, really. His meter, if you had it at home, might give you better numbers. At the clinic, her numbers are probably high due to the stress of having some strange people poking and handling her. At home, that stress isn't there. But a human meter will give you numbers that are accurate enough to successfully manage her diabetes. Human meters have worked for thousands of cats that have at one time or another been "here", and lots of them have gone on to remission. So yeah, good enough to work well!
I used a Relion Micro, and it worked well enough for Bob. :smile:
Carl
 
I had the same issue when we first started out... In Buca's first few weeks after diagnosis, I couldn't even get him to stay in the 300's... he was often in the 400's and even 500's!!!

Finally I had to go against my vet's advice (personal choice) and take him off the Hill's W/D and change his insulin (he didn't seem to respond well to the 4u bid Caninsulin).... That was mid-may, and now he's 8 days OTJ and his numbers are consistently in the 50's. :mrgreen:

ECID but one thing is for sure, you should try to get him off that dry food... we are feeding whiskas pate, but Fancy Feast pates are also very affordable and gluten free :-D
 
I wanted to switch insulin because she wasn't responding at all to Prozinc. In fact, I feel I'm wasting it now. I assume I need a vet to get different insulin. Once I get the home test going and convert completely to wet (not Hill's) food, I'll see where she is. Then maybe I can look at different insulins if appropriate.
 
Once you get her off the high carb food her numbers will stabilize and you can see how effective PZI is. You do have a good insulin- one of the better ones that vets prescribe.

Once the dry is gone you will be left with the real numbers that aren't carb inflated. Hang in there.
 
I just conducted her first glucose test. She came in at 336 about 90 minutes after I gave her shot. Tomorrow morning, I'll check her level pre-shot. She's been on just wet food since yesterday.
 
Yippee! The first (and successful) test of your treatment!

Good for you, and good for her. Give her skritches and tell her she's a brave girl.

It gets easier, trust me. Her wee morning tests are on automatic now. If I don't test her she gives me a look that says "What??!! No pokies?!! Hey! there's food!"
 
She was 236 before her shot today. I assume I'll have to monitor for a few days to see how the all wet diet is working.

I'm not changing anything yet but does anyone know what the max dosage of Prozinc is? My vet says 5 units twice per day is the absolute maximum.
 
I would definitely monitor today. We normally tell new diabetics not to shoot under 200, but to wait 20 minutes without feeding and retest to be sure the number is rising, not falling. Your 236 is a nice amps. I think you will want to watch carefully as the wet food kicks in because the numbers may be falling. You may need to lower the dose for the next cycle.
 
If you can, it would be very helpful to get a number around 6 hours after the shot, either am or pm or both. Without a mid cycle number, it is impossible to know what is really happening. Today, for example, the 3 units could have take him really low and the red number tonight could be a bounce. (If a kitty goes lower than they are used to, their body can release "emergency" glucose to raise the blood glucose levels. We see the result rise or bounce as an artificial number, caused by the low one.) If that is what happened, it would be wise to lower the dose. If the cycle was generally flat and rose naturally to the higher number at pmps, it would be a different scenerio. Without those midcycle numbers, we just can't know.

Try to get some midcycle numbers so we can figure out what to advise. (lots of us set the alarm for 6 hours after the shot, wake up in the night and test. It's a pain, but very helpful)

The other variable is the dry food. Is it all gone or could he have gotten into some today?
 
I'll get more frequent numbers tomorrow. One thing that I notice today is that she hasn't pooed since Wednesday. Usually she would go once a day.
 
Now that I have a few BG numbers from today, I need some help interpreting them. Her lowest reading is 181 at 6 hours after the shot. What does this mean? Should I adjust anything?
 
Good for you getting a curve! And some nice blues in the middle!

If you can't be around to monitor midcycle, I might lower as a precaution, maybe down to 2 units. What I'm thinking is that it sometimes takes a few days for the wet low carb to completely kick in so you might see lower numbers in the next few days. And it is always easier to up the dose as needed than to deal with dangerously low numbers.

Anything around 200 or lower at preshot should be a sign to reduce the dose or any number in the 40 range at midcycle.

If you like, you can post on the PZI forum. Everyone there uses or has used your insulin and can help with dose questions. Most people post their numbers daily and get feedback. It is a smaller forum than this one so post here any time you have an immediate question.
http://www.felinediabetes.com/FDMB/viewforum.php?f=24
 
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