Anyone with a diabetic cat?

Ok I was just told my kitty has diabeties and I would love to get to know some people with kitties of their own with diabetes since this will be new to me.. Anyone out there?

While I do not currently care for a diabetic kitty, over the years I have cared for three of them. If I can be of assistance to you in any way, please do not hesitate to ask.

Please give your little "sweetie" a gentle chin-scritch or two from me, won't you?

~gf~

I sure will... How much does supplies each month cost? Like insulin,needles or whatever else there is?

It has been about two years now since I have had to buy these things, but the last time I did, I was spending about $25 for the vial of Insulin, about $28 for a case of 100 syringes and about $16 for a 4 pound bag of a prescription dry food - this all lasted about a month, sometimes more or less, depending.

There are also vet fees to think about ... and unless you are willing to test your cat's blood at home with a glucometer then you will need to take her in at least once per month for a sugar check - after a while, I got smart and requested the serum fructosamine test instead. It gave an average of my cat's blood sugar levels over a two-week time period and I found it much easier to regulate using the data it gave us.

If your kitty is newly diagnosed, your vet fees may be higher at first but will decrease significantly once you have her better regulated.

One thing I want to mention to you is about the prescription food ... most vets are still recommending the Hill's Prescription Diet w/d for diabetic felines and mine all ate it - but I did a little research and found that Purina also makes a diabetic food formula (Called Purina Veterinary Diet d/m) and so I asked my vet if we could try it for the last sugar kitty I had ... she started on this food the first week of October and by the first week of January, her insulin requirement dropped by 4 units per day. This was an amazing discovery and it really helped to control her diabetes. You might want to ask your vet if you can try it - while it may not work as well for your baby, I had excellent results with it.

Here is an article which was published in a recent issue of the TCS Newsletter - it may be helpful to you:

http://www.thecatsite.com/Cats/Cat_H..._Diabetes.html

Best of luck,

~gf~

Hey thanks for that info

The Animal Medical Center in NYC did a study of high protein, low carb diets on diabetic cats and found it worked even better than the high fiber diets found in Hills w/d. The purpose of both diets is to reduce weight in the diabetic cat, but the high protein diet did it without causing muscle loss which is commonly found in the high fiber/high carb w/d diets. Both diets can produce a situation where insulin injections are no longer needed, but the high protein diet had a much higher success rate (68% vs 40%).

See http://catnutrition.org/Catkins.htm and
See http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/medi...p?newsid=16452

If you haven't already, you might look into the Yahoo! groups for feline diabetes. I have a cat with hyperthyroidism, and the group for that has been a great source of information and support.

Thanx