? 1/25 Rusty AMPS 334, +6 104, +9 175, PMPS 303, +4.5 125

Yesterday

Good Morning, L&LL,
Here we are in the pink stratosphere. It sure looks like the steroid shot that Rusty got on Jan. 8th-- and that seemed to wear off very early-- has re-established itself. Mysterious! I guess I'll hold the 0.25U dose for 3 more cycles before raising it to 0.5U, but only because we are seeing greens before the huge bounces. Anyway, Rusty is feeling good and is breathing well and his eyes are not weeping. He is eating very well: all his nighttime fuds were gone this morning (unusual).

A beautiful, cold winter day here. For dinner on a cold day I'm going to make a minestrone in my Instant Pot. When I make minestrone on the stove it takes about 5 hours of cooking time. In the Instant Pot it takes 8 minutes (after the steam has built up). (of course you still have to cut up the veggies).

Here I was wondering why Rusty's BG was so high and I had forgotten about the steroid shot
Happy to hear that he has recovered and YAY for being overnight CPC!

Thinking of getting an Instant Pot. @Ella & Rusty & Stu(GA) which one do you have and did you order directly from their site or Amazon?

I'm glad to hear Rusty is feeling well and eating for you. I hope you can get his numbers back down soon.

I'm thinking along the lines of what I mentioned the other day...the steroid was probably working all along, but temporarily overpowered by the illness Rusty picked up. I'd guess his BGs were down during that time because his appy was extra bad.

Awesome about the overnight CPC!!

Judy and Boomer said:

Thinking of getting an Instant Pot. @Ella & Rusty & Stu(GA) which one do you have and did you order directly from their site or Amazon?

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I have the Duo 6 quart, and I bought it directly from Instant Pot. I checked recently on Amazon and found that they are out of stock on this model and do not know if they will get it in again. I suspect that the Duo 6 is being replaced by the Duo 6 Plus (which adds 3 more cooking programs but is otherwise the same). Instant Pot's website still has the regular Duo 6.
You will absolutely love this pot. If you order it, also order the cookbook "The Essential Instant Pot" by Coco Morante. It is excellent.

Amy&TrixieCat said:

I'm thinking along the lines of what I mentioned the other day...the steroid was probably working all along, but temporarily overpowered by the illness Rusty picked up. I'd guess his BGs were down during that time because his appy was extra bad.

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Hi Amy, I think it's got to be something like your theory. Rusty had a Convenia antibiotic shot on Jan. 17, 5 days after his miraculous steroid-shot recovery "failed", and the a/b might have knocked out whatever bug he picked up (at the vet's??). In any event, he began to rally and feel better on Jan. 19, and by Jan. 21 was acting normally. Beginning on Jan 22 his bg numbers began their big rise. So perhaps it is the steroid re-asserting itself. If so, at present there are two agents at work in Rusty's body: the Depo Medrol steroid, and the Convenia antibiotic. We are 9 days into the 14-day effective period of the Convenia. We are 2 1/2 weeks into the 4-5 weeks effective period of the steroid.
My new motto: 1 day at a time!

It occurs to me that a "time line" might help in figuring out what is going on with Rusty. I made this yesterday and will try to upload it here: comments welcome @Marje and Gracie , @Wendy&Neko , @Sienne and Gabby (GA) @Linda and Bear Man . Please see my response to Amy's comment, above (@Amy&TrixieCat )

Nice to hear Rusty is eating well for you and he's feeling good.

I'm so glad Rusty has turned this around. I hope he continues to breathe well, eat well and that higher BGs are the worst of your worries with him, Ella. Good boy, Rusty!

Sorry - I'm no help. The only experience I had with steroids was budesonide (which didn't to anything to Neko's BG) and pred pills (which raised civie's Theo's BG about 20 points per 5 mg). I did notice Neko became more bouncy. But I do like your motto of one day at a time. That's the mode I had to get into - just roll with whatever the day gives you. Glad to hear it's a good one for Rusty today.

I did Melissa Clark's lentil soup last night in the IP, in 6 minutes. Definitely on the make it again list. We got the 6 Duo Plus on Amazon.ca on Black Friday sales.

I don’t know if I can come up with a cogent explanation for what is happening with Rusty and his reaction to treatments, but some random thoughts:

He had a good response to his first/second shots but eventually relapsed. Maybe the antibiotic worked on susceptible bacteria, but it didn’t quite get them all and he relapsed.

Not a very good response to third shot of Convenia. Perhaps (even though it has a pretty wide spectrum of action) he has some susceptible bacteria but at the same time some not susceptible bacteria that are not responding at all to the antibiotic. I wonder if they could do a culture on some of the nasal discharge?

If anything viral going on, antibiotics would not help at all.

Steroids would help out in reducing inflammation in his nasal passages, and often just induce cats to feel better. They can possibly impact the immune system, and make it a bit harder to fight infection.

I believe the Convenia has an optimum therapeutic range of about two weeks, though it remains in the system much longer. It seems to help Rusty more often than it fails.

He had normal blood work - no elevated white blood cells, so maybe his body is not fighting off infection? No elevated eosinophils, so not showing an allergic condition?

The vet, I believe, mentioned possibility of something else going on, but it isn’t practical to do diagnostics. However the fact that he tends to respond (mostly) well to antibiotics really seems to suggest something infectious.

Amazing short term response to Depo Medrol could have been a fluke perhaps.

He’s doing well now, so I’m going to pray, send vines, and hope he continues to rally.

Hoping Sienne and Marje have good theories about what’s happening.

Linda and Bear Man said:

He had a good response to his first/second shots but eventually relapsed. Maybe the antibiotic worked on susceptible bacteria, but it didn’t quite get them all and he relapsed.

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For what it's worth, Ella, Asia had a bad UTI at Chrstimas 2016, the convenia worked on it, but she got another UTI a few weeks later. I think the abx just didn't get it all and she had to get another shot.

Linda and Bear Man said:

He’s doing well now, so I’m going to pray, send vines, and hope he continues to rally.

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Thanks so much, Linda! I'll put Rusty's January 8th labs into the labs tab on his spreadsheet tomorrow. I don't know the abbreviations for the things you mentioned.
The first and second Convenia shots (in August) were for pneumonia. He no longer has pneumonia and both vets in the practice said his lungs were free. Whatever he has is in the upper respiratory tract (his old chronic congestion place).
Talk to you soon. Looking forward to your visit (as is Rusty!).