Diabetic Cat Food

Diabetes mellitus is a complex and sadly quite a common disease that afflicts many cats. Most of the time, you can detect the disease by observing a sudden weight loss in your cat. This is because insulin which is responsible for the breakdown of the glucose in the body is deficient and is thus unable to break down the glucose. The result is that the body starts breaking down the proteins and fats in the body. So although your cat may be hogging all day, it is not able to gain any weight. Along with this, there is a high level of sugar in the body which leads to excessive urination and thirst.

Managing feline diabetes is not an easy task with regular insulin injections, hypoglycemic medications and alteration in the cat's diet. However, along with other treatment measures, switching your cat's diet to include the appropriate diabetic food helps manage diabetes. Here is a diabetic cat food list that you should keep in mind before selecting the food for cats afflicted with high blood sugar levels.

Best Diabetic Food For Your Cat

Low Carbohydrate, High Protein Diet: The basic rule of the diabetic cat diet is one with low carbohydrates and high protein. This is because the natural function of the digestive system of cat and other carnivorous animals allows the absorption of fats and proteins as opposed to the carbohydrates present in cereals. So while other mammals derive it from carbohydrates, cats can get the glucose from proteins and fats itself. So high concentration of carbohydrates in the diet or vegetables can actually be detrimental to the health of the cat. It is important to keep in mind that most of the dry cat food is very high in carbohydrates and should be restricted for diabetic cats. Similarly rice, soy and other plant proteins are not easily digested by the cats and needs to be avoided.

Meat Products: According to me the diabetic cat food list should start and end with meat and meat products. You can feed your cat foods that have high levels of meat ingredients, like chicken, turkey, and beef, or even meat-by-products. Frozen raw food for cats is very high in proteins and has less carbohydrates. However watch out for the bacteria in the food. The best way to avoid any food poisoning or bacterial infections is to cook the meat. Homemade diabetic food for your cat is easy to make. All you need to do is chop up roasts, steaks or any other kind of beef into small sizes for you cat to chew on. You can combine this meat with salt, water, eggs, salmon oil, vitamin E, Vitamin B complex, taurine powder.

Stick To Canned Foods: If homemade foods are a hassle then you might want to stick to the various canned foods which contains meat by products. This is made up of those discarded animal parts that humans do not consume such as spleen, udders etc. So rather than feeding them the dry food that hampers with the food absorptions levels and contains no beneficial ingredients needed in a diabetic cat diet, stick to the wet canned food for cats. This not only contains sufficient proteins for the cat but also has water which is highly essential for absorption of the nutrition.

Avoid Fiber: It is a mistaken belief that cats need fiber in their food. The truth is that cats have a shorter gastrointestinal tract than humans and even dogs. The excessive fiber bulk puts pressure on the GI tract of cats leading to malabsorption of foods and the resultant digestive disorders.

In addition to this information on diabetic cat foods to eat, you must also know what foods to avoid. Onions, garlic, raisins, chocolate, grapes, tuna, raw fish, egg shells, mushrooms, avocados, persimmons, alcohol, pork, liver or dog foods should be completely avoided. Also, if you cat in suffering from a contributing medical problem such as obesity, kidney problems or pancreatitis then you have to alter the diet based on it. For kidney problems, there is a restriction on the amounts of protein content in the food while cats afflicted with pancreatitis are unable to digest the excess fats and thus needs to control it. Obesity is also one of the results of diabetes and needs to be controlled by restricting the carbohydrate intake in the food. Although a commercial cat food might say that it is meant for diabetic cats, please read the ingredient list to make sure that you do not pick up foods that have high carbohydrate levels.