? Updated Food Chart?

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Jeff D / Sketch

Jeff D / Sketch

Member Since 2017
HI all I hope all are doing OK (Members and Kitties) given the trying circumstances. I am wondering if there is a more updated food chart? The one I see and have downloaded is from 2017 and its awesome but certainly there have been some changes to products as well as new products. I have always gone with the Fancy Feast Classic Pate's. I notice there is a new "Fancy Feast Gourmet Naturals Pates" and curious if anyone has seen a nutritional breakdown and if so what the carb content is. I have sent Purina / Fancy Feast an email requesting the info but it may be slow coming because of the circumstances.
 
Best suggestion I can make for you, is to look at the ingredients label on the cat food. Look for any starch source, like grains, peas, potatoes, flour, vegetables, fruits. All unnecessary ingredients in a cat food, cheaper for the manufacturer to use than real meat. Cheaper end price for you. Look at the protein levels also. You want about 40% protein for a cat (unless your cat has stage 3-4 CKD). Fat is cheaper than meat also. So manufacturers put a lot of that into pet foods to hold down the price.

Look for "ingredient splitting", look for transparency on a manufacturers websites. Look for options you can FIND right now in the stores.

Liver will always have some carbs in it. But not usually enough on it's own to raise a diabetic cat's blood glucose level. Some cats are more carb sensitive than others. The lowest carb choice is not always the best choice for a diabetic cat. Some diabetic cats do better on 8-10% carbs.

If the food passes, the ingredients test, then take the guaranteed analysis maximum and minimums and run it through a basic cat food carb calculator.

Or run it through the formula Dr. Lisa Pierson has on her catinfo.org website.
 
Bron and Sheba (GA) said:
@Deb & Wink liver has 3.8 grams per 100 grams of carbs or 3 oz is 3.2 garbs so that is ok.
Were you meaning phosphorus?
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No @Bron and Sheba (GA) I was not meaning phosphorus.

I was suggesting that someone look at the ingredients on the food labels, to determine if a particular food included starch ingredients or other carb containing ingredients. Since the catinfo.org list is from 2017, it does not contain any foods that manufacturers have released in the last 3 years. So people need to do a bit of "homework" on their own, to determine if a particular food is appropriate for a diabetic cat.

You can't focus only on the carb content, because the amount of protein is important for a cat as is the water content of a food. But be aware that a low carb food could be low in protein, and high in fat. It's cheaper that way to manufacture pet food, with more fat.

This link below is by vet Dr. Lisa Pierson about dry food. But much of what she says is also applicable to wet food and our too narrow focus on the carb content.
Info Dry Food - PLEASE consider more than just carbohydrate content

I was also alerting this person to the fact that the lowest carb food is not always the best food for a diabetic cat.
See this discussion, https://www.tapatalk.com/groups/fdlibrary/low-carb-vs-lower-carb-t18.html#.UYOzScqi9Go

This vet journal article from 2006 talks about the value of low carb vs medium carb diets for diabetic cats. The study showed that low carb was better. https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1016/j.jfms.2005.08.004

I mentioned that liver contains carbs but it is not a "bad" carb source and not to worry about a cat food that contains liver. Some carbs are necessary for a cat's metabolism. Some people try to focus on eliminating all carbs from a cat's diet and that is erroneous and unnecessary thinking to completely eliminate carbohydrates from the diet. But if a cat food contains liver and other starchy/carb ingredients like potatoes, grains, peas, veggies, than that food would likely be higher carb than a food with only liver.

So do a rough carb calculation using an on-line carb calculator. They aren't perfect, they don't use "as fed" values, but those min/max calculators give you a rough idea if a food may be appropriate for a diabetic cat or not.
 
Deb & Wink said:
@Jeff D / Sketch
You're signature says you are feeding the Royal Canin Glycobalance food. Still the case? If not, you might want to update that info.

Do you have another diabetic cat? I see that Sketch passed away a couple of years ago.
Click to expand...

Hi yes I did adopt another cat that turned out to be diabetic! What are the odds? I started him on insulin and of course switched his diet off dry to wet first thing. I've been going with the Fancy Feast Classic Pates. After about a month and a half he went into remission and so far has remained OTJ for several months! When the virus hit there was a shortage of the FF classic pates and was looking for an alternative. I since have gotten some but also came across a newer pate not on the chart (Fancy Feast Gourmet Naturals Pates) they had come out with that looks pretty decent according to the nutritional info I got from Purina.
 
The new Fancy Feast Gourmet Naturals Pate line looks reasonable for a diabetic cat. The main difference between the Gourmet Natural (GN) line and the Classic line of FF is some of the ingredients.
Gourmet Natural vs Classic
no artificial colors artificial colors
no artificial flavors artificial flavors
no meat by-products meat by-products
costs more costs less
a bit less protein a bit more protein

Personally, I think I'd avoid the ones "In Gravy" and "with a Touch of Coconut."
When Petco announced they were eliminating all pet foods with artificial colors and ingredients, Purina who manufacturers the Fancy Feast and many other cat food lines, came out with these foods to meet those requirements.

But who knows which came first. Petco's decision or Purina's changes. Sort of a which came first, the chicken or the egg conundrum.

If you have some "as fed" values from the company, please share them here. Thanks.

p.s. What's the new diabetic cat's name? Picture?
 
Jeff --

The amount of work that goes into updating Dr. Lisa's food chart is HUGE. She actually contacts every manufacturer that doesn't list the "as fed" values on their website and tries to get their data. Consider how long that list of food is! Frankly, she swore she wouldn't update the list the time prior to the 2017 update.

I don't think she has any help when it comes to updating.
 
Jeff D / Sketch said:
The White meat chicken pate.
Click to expand...
Deb & Wink said:
The new Fancy Feast Gourmet Naturals Pate line looks reasonable for a diabetic cat. The main difference between the Gourmet Natural (GN) line and the Classic line of FF is some of the ingredients.
Gourmet Natural vs Classic
no artificial colors artificial colors
no artificial flavors artificial flavors
no meat by-products meat by-products
costs more costs less
a bit less protein a bit more protein

Personally, I think I'd avoid the ones "In Gravy" and "with a Touch of Coconut."
When Petco announced they were eliminating all pet foods with artificial colors and ingredients, Purina who manufacturers the Fancy Feast and many other cat food lines, came out with these foods to meet those requirements.

But who knows which came first. Petco's decision or Purina's changes. Sort of a which came first, the chicken or the egg conundrum.

If you have some "as fed" values from the company, please share them here. Thanks.

p.s. What's the new diabetic cat's name? Picture?
Click to expand...
 
The "new" diabetic cat's name is Oliver. He is also FIV positive so an indoor kitty. Trying to get a pic of him and the food chart from Purina on this site but having issues with my Chromebook and posting. Got the food chart! The Purina Gourmet looks good according to the chart so I ordered some and will see if he likes it. There was a bit of confusion from Purina when I asked for the protein/ fat/ carb breakdown so I requested the chart. They had told me in an email it was 60% carb content!!! I wrote them back and said that cannot be correct and they then sent the actual nutritional info.
Oliver as I mentioned has been in remission so I never did an entire profile on him with spread sheet. Since he has been in remission I only test him every couple of weeks to confirm he's good. Last test and the highest reading I've seen using a Bayer Contour meter since remission was 76 so still good! I watch closely his behavior to see if he displays any symptomatic behavior...Litter box activity, water consumption appetite increase etc. that might indicate him coming out of remission. So far so good Heres food info.
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Deb & Wink said:
The new Fancy Feast Gourmet Naturals Pate line looks reasonable for a diabetic cat. The main difference between the Gourmet Natural (GN) line and the Classic line of FF is some of the ingredients.
Gourmet Natural vs Classic
no artificial colors artificial colors
no artificial flavors artificial flavors
no meat by-products meat by-products
costs more costs less
a bit less protein a bit more protein

Personally, I think I'd avoid the ones "In Gravy" and "with a Touch of Coconut."
When Petco announced they were eliminating all pet foods with artificial colors and ingredients, Purina who manufacturers the Fancy Feast and many other cat food lines, came out with these foods to meet those requirements.

But who knows which came first. Petco's decision or Purina's changes. Sort of a which came first, the chicken or the egg conundrum.

If you have some "as fed" values from the company, please share them here. Thanks.

p.s. What's the new diabetic cat's name? Picture?
Click to expand...
 

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