Newly Diagnosed With Diabetes But Its Blood Sugar Remains High
An anxious owner is worried as his cat has been newly diagnosed with diabetes but its blood sugar remains high. This is despite the cat spending three nights at the vets and being put on a special diet, insulin and an antibiotic for an infection. The blood sugar reduces but then goes high again.
Yes, it does take time to regulate a cat. But also things to consider are that a stressed cat will also raise its blood sugar and normally a vets practice can be quite stressful. Also an infection can also raise blood sugar levels. A helpful reader replies:-
“How long it takes varies from cat to cat and how you treat the diabetes. Some cats who follow the suggestions and recommendations of this board can go into remission with a few short weeks, others may not reach remission for a few months. Then there are cats who will always need insulin and diet to be regulated and there’s nothing wrong with that. Things like using a not recommended short acting insulin, feeding a poor diet, and blindly giving insulin without testing the blood glucose level are some factors that can prevent a cat from being regulated.”
The vet recommended a low card WD diet and another reader replies:-
“W.D. is rarely used anymore…….old school thought. Nothing but fiber and will not help. If you remove all dry food and feed only canned, you will see a rapid change and improvement but…….do not change food or remove dry till you can hometest first. Removing higher carb food whether canned or dry can dramatically lower insulin needs and you do not want to risk causing a hypo.”
“Instead of the W/D, you can feed a commerical brand of canned food. W/D is not low carb anyways, The dry is around 40% and the canned is 26%. Ideally a diabetic cat should have no more than 10% carbs. As you’ve seen, many cats don’t like the taste of prescription food.”
Very good advice. You need to regularly test your cats blood sugar levels at home to ensure the correct amount of insulin is being given and you need to make sure that a low card high protein diet is administered. So if your cat is newly diagnosed with diabetes but its blood sugar remains high then you need to look at diet and home testing.
