Any from the UK?

Any UK people on this site, just wondering as i am obviously from the UK in London and have found we lack a lot of resources over here luckily the Cousin countries have better sense :lol:

Anyway i would be interested to here the experience people are getting with vets, insulin and general kitty diabetes

 

Hullo from HASTINGS

We oldies have cared for three diabetic cats, although from age and infirmity have had to give up.

There are members in the London area, I hope they will contact you.
I will send you a PM with my phone number.
Cats Protection have a diabetic register which may have someone near you.

Are you hometesting?
We can help.
Ask any questions you like, someone will find an answer

Mary

 

Hello from Essex

Hi ... and welcome to the FDMB community.

There are several UK members, some of whom are in the London area. I will send you a PM with my contact details. If we can be of any help, please get in touch.

Love

 

hi so nice to hear from you
We are home testing and wow she hates that lol and i test her pretty frequently tbh when she first came to me she was on over 33 so really bad i got her down to 9.1 yesterday then it went down again but at least one reading was good she gets to about 4 before food but obviously she is not regulated yet so she is constantly wanting food lol

What food are you feeding yours, we went to botiza but as she is a foster I'm meant to get food through the vet but they won't get that so not sure how long i can keep botiza up.

what insulin are you on we are currently on the dreaded caninusliln but should be getting it changed on tuesday

 

Re: Hello from Essex

Thank you for that its lovely to hear that there are some of the uk members here, how have you been finding the treatment in the uk for FD i have found its quite difficult to get insulin other than caninsulin

 

I just sent you another PM before I read your latest post ... Sorry.

Keep going with the hometesting ... Tilly will get used to it in time. Make sure you give her a little reward after each test.

As for the best cat food for diabetics ... Butchers Classic Cat Food. Only ASDA seem to be stocking this at the moment but it's worth hunting some down.

Love

 

Hi there - we are in Exeter. Issey was dx a couple of months ago and has been quite high - until we changed her food, now her numbers before jabbing are about 10 lower than they were and are normal if I test 4-6 hours after insulin.
Yes, we too are on the dreaded Caninsulin and she does seem to be settling down on it. The vet is happy to try other insulins if she can't settle in the long term - the cascade principle vets work on here means that they can prescribe "human" medicines if it is in the best interest of the animal. However, as I have found with Issey also having asthma, human drugs (she has a ventolin inhaler - the type the NHS hand out like confetti) and they cost an absolute fortune.
Applaws is pretty good, which you can get from Pets at Home - and they have an own-brand "deli" food which is very similar. Sainsburys do Encore cat food, which is again very low carb. The only problem is that these are not complete foods. The Applaws dry is about 15 per cent carb, which is not great, but the carbs come from potato, not grain, so is a slower-releasing carb.

Good luck!

 

Hi thanks for your reply. Well Tilly started off very high then we had some big drops and today she was sick and then was hypo with only a 2.0 reading took her to the vet, no ketones but she has lost some weight again the poor thing was only 2.25 when she came now she is 2.2 so insulin not working yet she is in overnight for drips and so on so feeling worried at the moment I'm hoping she can come home tomorrow.

 

Sounds likes the insulin is working a little too well if she is having hypos.
testing at 4.0 before feeding is really too low - although it would be fine if your cat was a non-diabetic, it's a number I would not be comfortable with seeing as there's not much margin for error there.

Remind me again what sort of dose Tilly is on, as it sounds to me like it needs to be lower.

Keeping my fingers crossed for her. Is a good sign that her body is responding to insulin and that she has no ketones, so hopefully you will both hang on in there - I'm sure everyone will tell you it's a real rollercoaster, especially at the start. My vet always reminds me, when I go into meltdown, that he would love it if he could give a diagnosis of diabetes, give the patient some tablets and then say "these will make you better - just keep taking them twice a day", but it is a constantly changing disease, which is affected by so many things!

Let us know how she is

Catherine x

 

Thanks Catherine,
That put a smile on my face knowing others go to meltdown as well mine knows I'm a bit insane crazy cat lady lol so he is very sensitive with me, well she is on 3 units of caninsulin which we are going to lower. Spoke to the nurse this morning as the vet was busy and she was stable all throughout the night
so that is great she has only eaten a little this morning though but tbh she is a picky eater when it comes to wet she still misses her dry, sometimes you have to convince her to eat the wet with a bit of love. I am really hoping i can get her today although the vet wanted to observe her on insulin for the day.

We definitely think she needs a smaller dose we upped it cause she started in 2 units twice a day and her keels were unreadable they were that high but clearly a middle ground needs to be found.

He always says to me though that not to jump to conclusions and start changing her doses as it a roller coaster and it takes time to find the balance