Nutrition
Dietary control
Insulin treatment helps pet owners manage their pet’s diabetes, but diet also helps control the disease and a pet’s sugar levels. A diabetic pet’s diet must provide for all its nutritional needs and should minimize post-meal glucose fluctuations. An ideal diabetic diet for cats should be:
- Consistent from day to day to prevent unnecessary changes in insulin requirements
- Fat-restricted
- Contain a high-quality, highly digestible protein source (eg, eggs or meat rather than soybean or corn gluten meal)
- Of the correct caloric value to help the pet achieve optimal body weight
- Low in carbohydrates
There are a number of prescription diets that are specially formulated for diabetic patients. These can be particularly useful for achieving weight loss in obese pets. However, most diabetic cats can be stabilized on a carefully controlled program using their normal diet. Stabilization on a non-prescription diet is much easier if a complete, moist food is being fed.
Clean drinking water should be available at all times. A reduction in excessive water consumption indicates successful management of diabetes mellitus.
Importance of an ideal body weight
In cats that are underweight or overweight, pursue respective weight gain or loss to help your pet achieve its ideal body weight.
In underweight animals, calorie-dense diets should be avoided, especially those that are high in soluble carbohydrates.
Obesity contributes to insulin resistance. Overweight cats should lose weight in a gradual, controlled fashion. Weight loss in obese animals decreases the insulin requirement.
More information
The following pet food companies produce balanced diets formulated for diabetic cats. For more information, click on each company name to reach its website: