Mary Allen
Diabetes in cats is becoming more common. Ten-year-old Momo is also affected. Thanks to insulin injections, she hardly suffers from any symptoms – but it is difficult for her owners.
While Momo, the black and white cat, watches the automatic vacuum cleaner in the living room, her owner Andrea Kaspar goes into the kitchen. The woman takes the insulin pen and squeezes a drop out of it onto a piece of kitchen paper to make sure the needle isn’t clogged. Because the wrong dose could be life-threatening for the cat. Momo has to be given exactly five units of insulin every morning and evening, which enables the cat to live a symptom-free life despite diabetes.
“Come on, Momo, the syringe,” calls Kaspar. The animal is obviously not afraid of it, it actually comes to her. The woman takes the cat between her legs and knees, grabs a fold of skin from Momo’s neck with one hand, pushes the pen in with the other, and that’s it. Momo didn’t even flinch.
Yes Not Too Much
The Kaspar couple has been doing this for four and a half years, every morning and every evening, and it has long since become routine. But things didn’t always go so smoothly. “In the beginning, spraying was difficult,” says Andrea Kaspar. “Sometimes some of the insulin went astray and we didn’t really know how much actually got under the skin and how much ended up in the fur instead.”
Re-injecting is out of the question because if the dose is too high, the blood sugar level drops and this is life-threatening for the animal. On the other hand, a dose that is too low is not tragic in individual cases, but if the cat lacks insulin for a longer period of time, it becomes problematic again: the typical diabetes symptoms such as frequent urination and weight loss can occur again. In the worst case, the cat threatens to fall into a life-threatening coma.
Kaspars has had a hangover with diabetes before. “When we found out that Momo also had diabetes, we were frustrated at first,” says Andrea Kaspar. They recognized the problem because the cat was getting thinner and thinner. After the diagnosis, it was all about finding the right dosage of insulin to get Momo’s weight up. “I spent hours next to the bowl so that she would eat anything at all,” remembers Kaspar. Momo was given her own always-stocked food bowl in the laundry room—although a chip sensor in the cat flap made sure the couple’s other cat didn’t get in and overeat. They meticulously measured the water in the drinking bowl to know how much Momo had eaten.
Those first few months of caring for the animal and the constant monitoring, blood sugar tests, and medical exams were very stressful. But what would have been the alternative? The cat was six years old at the time. “If we didn’t inject, Momo would most likely not be alive,” says Kaspar.
Momo is not an isolated case. There are no figures on the situation in Switzerland, but it is known from Great Britain that diabetes in cats is increasing, as Claudia Reusch, director of the Clinic for Small Animal Medicine at the University of Zurich, says. It usually shows a form that is very similar to type 2 diabetes in humans. “It has to do with the changing way of life,” she suspects. “The biggest risk factor is being overweight. Cats used to be outside and had to move around to find their food. Today they are fed nutrient-rich feed and have too little exercise.” This corresponds to the finding that diabetes occurs less frequently in outdoor cats who move more than indoor cats.
Although Momo is an indoor cat, she was never too fat. “Because we have ruled out all other causes, we suspect that she has a tumor that is pressing on the pituitary gland,” explains the owner. This gland is located in the skull and controls the hormonal balance.
Accounting for the Syringes
A tumor could possibly be operated on, but that will not happen with Momo. “We have friends who find it strange that we give our cat injections,” says Andrea Kaspar. “To be honest, I find it a bit silly myself. But to operate now would be going too far even for me. Momo is still an animal.”
Since the right dosage for the insulin has been found, the financial outlay has been kept within limits. The hormone costs about 15 francs per month. It is particularly complicated to organize care for Momo when the Kaspars go away for a long time. In the meantime, however, they have found a veterinary student who dares to give the cat injections. And if necessary, they sometimes skip a dose, Momo endures that without complications.
Splashing also requires a clear head. At least eleven hours must elapse between the administration of the injections. “Only once was my husband not in the matter and injected four hours too early,” says Andrea Kaspar. “But he noticed it right away and fed her cookies so that the blood sugar level didn’t drop too much. The blood sugar measurement then showed that everything was fine.” In order to keep track, the Kaspars keep a clean record of the injections administered.