While feline diabetes is a serious condition that needs immediate medical treatment, its diagnosis need not overwhelm a cat owner. The disease, which often leads to kidney failure, is treatable and even reversible. Many cats live for years while being treated for diabetes. Others respond so well to diet and lifestyle changes that they no longer need treatment at all.
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What is Feline Diabetes?
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Also known as diabetes mellitus and sugar diabetes, the disease occurs when a cat's pancreas stops producing enough insulin or the insulin becomes inefficient. When insulin stops working properly, levels of glucose, or blood sugar, stay too high. Glucose normally fuels the body's cells with energy, and when that energy is not available the organs begin to malfunction, attempting to overcompensate.
What is Feline Kidney Failure?
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Without proper fuel from glucose, a cat's kidneys will begin to work harder trying to flush out excess sugar in the blood. This causes a high thirst drive and more frequent urination. After all this hard work, the kidneys become damaged. This is also known as chronic renal failure, or CRF.
Symptoms
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Cats are notoriously good at hiding symptoms of illness. The general rule for any cat owner should be to call your veterinarian for an appointment as soon as a new behavior is noticed. It's easy to tell yourself, "the cat is drinking more water, that's great that he's flushing out his system." While increased water intake might seem healthy, it signals possible kidney damage.
Other symptoms include frequent urination, increase of appetite, and weight loss despite eating well. Ultimately, untreated feline diabetes causes suffering and death.
Causes
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Just like in humans, feline diabetes may be type 1 or type 2. Type 2 is the most common, caused by a low-quality diet that is high in carbohydrates and low in nutrition. Usually these cats have been free-fed dry kibble made with grains and ingredients like corn, rice, flour and potato. Avoiding such food is an important key to preventing feline diabetes.
Although less common, another possible cause of feline diabetes is a damaged pancreas due to inflammation, infection, heredity or steroid medication.
Treatment
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Cats diagnosed with diabetes will likely need to begin daily insulin injections immediately. This will keep blood sugar at a consistent level so the organs can go back to functioning normally. There are pills available as an alternative to insulin shots, but it can take months for the pills to take effect and some cats do not respond well. Blood sugar will need to be monitored daily. This can be done at home with urine dipsticks and blood testing kits.
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