6/17: Sammy - AMPS 123; +6 103; PMPS 93

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Tina & Sammy

Tina & Sammy

Member Since 2010
Yesterday's Condo

So last night I decided to stick with the .5 unit dose because Sammy wasn't eating well for most of the day and had been vomiting just about everything from about +10 AMPS. I had no idea how long it was going to continue, so I felt really nervous about shooting a higher dose of insulin.

After vomiting at +2, I fed him some different food and he ate most of the small portion I gave him and was able to keep it down for more than 2 hours. Thank goodness. I gave him a bit more at +4 and off to bed I went. Since he was still over 200 I set the auto feeder to provide another snack at +6 and set the alarm for +9.75.

Sammy ended up coming to bed with me, which I was happy about because he had not done that in more than a week.

At +9.75 I got up to give him a snack, and he had eaten part of the +4 and +6 snacks that were left for him, but not all of it. I was worried that he would be close to 300 again, but I was VERY PLEASANTLY surprised when I saw 137. That's right folks 137. I offered him a snack at +9.75 but he didn't seem interested I left it out for him and went back to bed. After going back to bed I thought that maybe that 137 might be a bad strip, but I decided to just wait until AMPS to see what his number was, either way I wouldn't be able to do anything about it until AMPS anyway.

After going back to bed I lay in bed thinking about what dose I was going to give him at AMPS. Yes, I was probably over analyzing, but that is what I do. Not being able to sleep because of the anxiety over whether or not the strip was good or not I ended getting up at +11 to wait for the next test. Sammy still had not eaten any of the snack I gave him an hour before. So I pulled up the snack in hope of having a clean AMPS reading.

And yes, he was still close to 100 and in the normal range at AMPS. I don't know if I should celebrate just yet because this number could have a lot to do with the fact that he still ate very little over night and since yesterday morning. And because of this I did reduce the dose back to .25 unit this morning. More than likely I will need to increase again once he is eating better. We will have to wait and see.

Maybe he will even get back to GREEN today, but if he surfs the 120's all day I will be EXTREMELY happy.

We hope everyone has an awesome day!
 
I'm glad Sammy seems to be feeling better....continuing to send more prayers your way. I hear ya on the over analysis...I'm also an expert at it, and I manage to make myself crazy with it.

Keep eating and feeling better, Sammy!
 
Sammy is still having an issue with vomiting. He hasn't eaten anything since AMPS and he just drank some water and the vomited it up a few minutes later.
 
I am wondering if he is having a pancreatitis attack. He needs something for the nausea. You don't want him to develop food aversions to the food he is eating. Have you called your vet?

Another thought is didn't you recently change his food? I know usually that might cause diarrhea but perhaps something in it doesn't agree with him?
 
Tina & Sammy said:
And yes, he was still close to 100 and in the normal range at AMPS. I don't know if I should celebrate just yet because this number could have a lot to do with the fact that he still ate very little over night and since yesterday morning. And because of this I did reduce the dose back to .25 unit this morning. More than likely I will need to increase again once he is eating better. We will have to wait and see.
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Hope Sammy is feeling better and back to normal ASAP!

Like you say, it's difficult to draw conclusions about dose when kitty isn't eating normally. Playing it by ear is about all you can do. Checking for ketones is important under these circumstances. A kitty's BG numbers do not have to be high to develop ketones.
 
Sammy finally ate again at +5.5. I will monitor him closely to make sure he holds it down. Hopefully, he has turned the corner. I will be giving him famotidine once a day for the next week or so as a preemptive strike against nausea. I spoke to the vet this morning and if he is still vomiting by tomorrow she wants to give him a stronger anti-nausea medication. She also thinks that he could be having a pancreatitis flare up and unless we see some improvements she might want to have that tested in case he needs pain medication as well.
 
julie & punkin (ga) said:
poor little guy. I hope something helps with his vomiting & feeling yucky.

Did you see Jill's comment last night about testing for ketones asap?
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Yes, I did see that this morning, Thanks. I will test him the next time I see him going to the litter box. Although, even when he was in the 400's and 500's he never developed ketones before.
 
Ketones aren't necessarily about high numbers, but about the "recipe" ingredients all being there - infection/inflammation + not enough insulin + not enough food. Ketones can develop even at lower numbers. There is a good post about ketones in the New to the Group sticky, at the bottom in the single topic links.
 
tiffmaxee said:
I am wondering if he is having a pancreatitis attack. He needs something for the nausea. You don't want him to develop food aversions to the food he is eating. Have you called your vet?

Another thought is didn't you recently change his food? I know usually that might cause diarrhea but perhaps something in it doesn't agree with him?
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That is what the vet is thinking. We are going to give it another 24 hours or so and see how he does. If he doesn't improve then we might have the test to see if he is having a pancreatitis flare up, the vet said he might need pain medication as well. I asked if I could give famotidine more than once a day, but she didn't recommend it. If the once a day famotidine isn't enough then she mentioned giving a stronger anti-nausea medication. I can't remember the name, but I think others have mentioned it here it starts with a "C".
 
julie & punkin (ga) said:
Ketones aren't necessarily about high numbers, but about the "recipe" ingredients all being there - infection/inflammation + not enough insulin + not enough food. Ketones can develop even at lower numbers. There is a good post about ketones in the New to the Group sticky, at the bottom in the single topic links.
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Okay, thanks for that information. I will go check out that post.
 
Amy&TrixieCat said:
I agree wiith Elise.... think a call to the vet is a good idea - maybe a cerenia injection is needed at this point. Please feel better, Sammy!
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Cerenia, might be the nausea medication the vet mentioned, but it sounded like it was a pill that you give ever other day. Maybe it is a shot, I am not sure. We really didn't get that far with that conversation.
 
Cerenia can be both injected and oral pills. If a kitty is vomiting, often the vet will give a shot that lasts about 24 hours, if i recall correctly. That quiets down the vomiting and then you can follow with pills to keep the vomiting and nausea down. We had good luck with Cerenia with punkin.

Some people also have found Ondansetron works well for the same issues with their cats - it's a human med that is obtained with a vet's prescription at a regular pharmacy.
 
julie & punkin (ga) said:
Cerenia can be both injected and oral pills. If a kitty is vomiting, often the vet will give a shot that lasts about 24 hours, if i recall correctly. That quiets down the vomiting and then you can follow with pills to keep the vomiting and nausea down. We had good luck with Cerenia with punkin.

Some people also have found Ondansetron works well for the same issues with their cats - it's a human med that is obtained with a vet's prescription at a regular pharmacy.
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Thanks, it is amazing what I have learned by going through this process. Sammy is currently napping in his favorite spot in the spare bedroom. Hopefully the vomiting has subsided for now.
 
Yep, what Julie said about cerenia. My vet says the injection can last up to 72 hours, but I usually restart pills within 48 hours just to stay ahead. Trix gets Cerenia pills every 36 hours to stay ahead of any CKD-induced nausea. Any time Trix's vomiting got ahead of the pills, we've gone for an injection and that got things back on track.

I'm not advocating you go against your vet, but famotadine can be given twice a day if needed....just an FYI!

Also FWIW, the p-titis test isn't always accurate...if a kitty has something else going on (like CKD), it can give a false positive.

Does your vet have evening hours by any chance? I don't know if I would want to wait until tomorrow if he does have p-titis, but if they have evening hours, you could observe during the day and take him tonight if he's still not well.

Hopefully it's a thing of the past, though.
 
How long a cerenia injection lasts I think is one of those ECID. I do know that they don't absorb as much of the pill so a shot to start is a good idea. You wouldn't need to bring him in for that as its a sub-q injection. How is he now?:bighug:
 
Amy&TrixieCat said:
Yep, what Julie said about cerenia. My vet says the injection can last up to 72 hours, but I usually restart pills within 48 hours just to stay ahead. Trix gets Cerenia pills every 36 hours to stay ahead of any CKD-induced nausea. Any time Trix's vomiting got ahead of the pills, we've gone for an injection and that got things back on track.

I'm not advocating you go against your vet, but famotadine can be given twice a day if needed....just an FYI!

Also FWIW, the p-titis test isn't always accurate...if a kitty has something else going on (like CKD), it can give a false positive.

Does your vet have evening hours by any chance? I don't know if I would want to wait until tomorrow if he does have p-titis, but if they have evening hours, you could observe during the day and take him tonight if he's still not well.

Hopefully it's a thing of the past, though.
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That is good to know about the pancreatitis test and the false positives with other issues. I wonder if the vet would give pain meds without the confirmation of pancreatitis?

Yes, my vet does have evening hours. Sammy ate at +5.5 and at +7.5 he hasn't vomited. We are going to play it by ear and see how he does. I also discontinued the ConSeal Phosphorous Binder for right now. It seems to be aggravating the situation as well. I was able to get my vet to order some and they charged me $25 a box. They said they were going to charge everyone else $30. I thought that was crazy seeing how your vet only charged $20. But that is okay, I was willing to pay the $25.

I did ask about doing famotidine 2x daily, knowing that you give 5 mg twice daily. I am actually only giving same a ¼ tablet which is only about 2.5mg, so I would think it would be okay to give that twice daily. But seeing how he seems to be doing okay for right now I won't rock the boat. I will give him a ¼ tablet tonight and see how he does tomorrow morning.
 
tiffmaxee said:
How long a cerenia injection lasts I think is one of those ECID. I do know that they don't absorb as much of the pill so a shot to start is a good idea. You wouldn't need to bring him in for that as its a sub-q injection. How is he now?:bighug:
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He hasn't vomited for a couple of hours now. and he ate just over 2 hours ago. He ate almost all of one of his mini meals. He has been sleeping pretty much since he ate. I have wanted to try to get him to eat more, but I thought it would be better to let him sleep and let the food digest. I know when I have an upset tummy it feels better when I am not thinking about it. I will try to get him to eat again at +9 in an hour.
 
I used to give Tiffany 2.5 mg of Pepcid right before bed and it stopped the early morning issue. If it's acid that should do it. If the nausea is from something else it won't do enough. So it's a good idea to try that and see I think. I hope it works.
 
tiffmaxee said:
I used to give Tiffany 2.5 mg of Pepcid right before bed and it stopped the early morning issue. If it's acid that should do it. If the nausea is from something else it won't do enough. So it's a good idea to try that and see I think. I hope it works.
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What is urs acid?
 
I just tested Sammy at +9 and he is at 91, which is good, but when I put food in front of him he just walked away. He did just wake up so I am not too concerned just yet. I will leave it out and hopefully he will want some before too long.
 
On my iPad now. Does he usually want to eat at that time or is it a sometimes kind of thing? I ask because I have to wake Max up a lot to test. He just isn't hungry after +7-8. If this is unusual for Sammy I still think nausea is in play here.
 
tiffmaxee said:
On my iPad now. Does he usually want to eat at that time or is it a sometimes kind of thing? I ask because I have to wake Max up a lot to test. He just isn't hungry after +7-8. If this is unusual for Sammy I still think nausea is in play here.
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Yes, he typically wants to eat at +9, I definitely think he is still a little nauseous. I will be giving him a Famotidine in about an hour, which will be about an hour before PMPS. Hopefully that will help and he will want to eat. I am going to take him outside again right now and hopefully he will want to eat a bit. That is what happened earlier today, he went outside ate some grass and then decided to have a little bit to eat.
 
Sammy is eating a little better tonight. after only eating between 3-5 oz of food over the last 24 hours or so I think he is doing much better. I don't want to force too much food on him too quickly, as I know I how feel after being sick. I did give him a Famotidine at around 4:30 pm and followed that up with fluids at +11. He did end up eating a bit a little after the fluids. At PMPS he wasn't too interested in food, but I made him up a couple of plates and he did finally eat on his own at around +.5 - +.75, and then again at +1.25. He does seem very tired and worn out, but I suppose that is to be expected.

So far his numbers have been good and I am hoping that we are able to hold the .25 unit dose even after he starts eating a bit more, only time will tell.
 
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