Testing Urine Glucose and Ketones

How to Measure Urine Glucose and Ketones

Depending on your veterinarian’s advice, you may be testing samples of your cat’s urine 1–3 times per day

• Early in the morning, just before the (first) insulin injection and meal
• Late in the afternoon, just before the (second) insulin injection and meal
• Late at night (just before bedtime)

If monitoring once daily, ideally the measurements should be made at the same time every day.

Tools

How to Collect a Urine Sample

• Some cats are quite proud about using a litter tray and may even announce when they are heading that way. For some cats, it may even be possible to catch a small sample of urine in a clean, dry container (dish, bowl, or small pan). When your cat begins to urinate, slowly slide the container under the urine stream.
• Make sure only your diabetic cat has access to this tray and keep them indoors so that they have no other option than to urinate in the prepared litter tray.
• Examples of non-absorbent cat litters than can help with urine collection include Katkor (little spherical litter beads which don’t absorb the urine) or Kit4Cat™ (which is a hydrophobic [non-absorbing] sand).
• Once your cat has urinated within the litter tray use a pipette to transfer the urine into a sample pot (this is included within the special cat litter kits).

Using Urine Dipsticks