Help needed for newbie (giving 1st shots)

I am between a rock and a hard place (YES I AM A NEWBIE). My 14 yr old male cat was diagnosed with diabetes a few months ago (after losing several pounds). My current vet and I have tried Glipizide for the last 2 months with some reduction in glucose levels - from 430 to around 250 or so. trouble is that the diabetic neuropathy in the back legs seems to be getting worse...
I finally got my vet to prescribe Lantus Solostar pen - problem is that my cat FREAKS out when the skin is even pinched to give a shot. Have tried distraction, petting him and slipping a shot. I am confronted by a shrieking cat who has no issue with drawing blood on me (he even lost a claw last time). Just the thought of a shot terrifies him (Zeus). Even the few drops of frontline plus sends him under the bed (unless i can catch him asleep). I know the Glipizide isn't working well enough - after several weeks of methyl B12 - no improvement in the legs. Have switched to a low-carb wet food with little trouble. But he remains terrified of an attempted shot - the stress of getting a shot is of course worse that the shot itself - any advice would be greatly appreciated....(i can't even pick him up now - no trust...
I am going to a new vet next week - understand she is the "cat vet" for the area. At least she is familiar with Lantus, my other vet was not, nor did he give me any help with giving a shot...

 

Hi
I'm sure you'll get lots of advice from people far more experienced that I am as I'm only 4 weeks in but I thought I'd never be able to get my cat to accept the injections and I was so stressed about them to begin with.
I found that buying some skytec fingerless gloves gave me confidence that I wouldn't get hurt so much which enabled me to be calmer. I make sure she's hungry then give her a small portion of a pouch of food which she loves, for Rosie sardines or mackerel (low carb of course!) and I feed it in the same place every time but not where she usually eats. She hates the skin pinch more that the jab too so I don't pull it too far up and get on with it quickly. She has become used to it now and seems to expect it so if you persevere you will get there.
And trust me Rosie is feisty and I wasn't great at first! People on here have had to be very reassuring to me when I've done fur shots and messed up.
Good luck with it all xx

 

thx - every speck of advice helps. That is an idea, i could cut out the fingers of some mechanic gloves, if the sight of the gloves doesn't send the cat running for cover. I really don't want to throw a towel and force a shot - I don't think that could ever work more than once or twice - not to mention the stress factor

 

Yes any gloves that make you feel safer will give you confidence. Trust me you will get there, I don't usually bother to put mine on now and I've only been doing it a few weeks.

I feared I would have to resort to the towel, I even looked at special wraps online but it's best to find a way to get your cat to cooperate in the long run. The vet said that the towel/wrap works the first few times but then it becomes harder to wrap the cat than it is to give the jab!

Let us know how you get on x

 

For my Patches II is inject when she is fining eating.
Also, depending upon the body condition of the cat, you may be able to not even tent if you use the syringes with the very short 6 mm length. yu can get syrnges with 6 mm, 8 mm (5/15 inch) and 1/2 inch length.
If you have a very skinny cat tenting may be necessary

 

I have the long 12mm and the VERY short 4mm nano needles. That was 1 question I had for the vet, if tenting was necessary with the short 4mm nano needles. You can directly go straight in with a person, but...................Zeus was down to 12lbs when I 1st noticed how skinny he was. He is now up to 14lbs, so the high protein and low-carb diet is working. He is a HUGE cat, but oddly enough he was never overweight, he just dropped weight. His normal is about 15ibs. He has been VERY skiddish for the last several months - I wonder if this "mental" state is due to prolonged glucose levels ???? I tried the "towel-wrap" the 2nd time I attempted a shot - never succeeded - you would think a "hell-cat" escaped - about gave me and him both a heart-attack. I'm gonna wait until next week after seeing the new vet before I attempt a shot. I think a quick jab with the 4mm needle pen might be the best route. Gonna try the loving, with food, with catnip approach this time next week. Thx for all of the advice - keep it coming - I love my cat...

 

You must be using the pen needles with the pen. The pen needles come in 4, 5, 8, and 12.7 mm (1/2 inch). The pen only doses in 1-unit increments and most cats need smaller increments.
Also, I have used the pen with pen needles because I had a high-dose cat *up to 25 units) so 1 unit increments was fine but I found it a lot easier to use a syringe and draw the insulin from the spot on the pen when yo insert the pen needle.
I would try a syringe sine it may be easier.

 

Yes, i got the pin needles at 4 & 12mm. The Solostar doesn't dose in 1/2 increments - true. Other pens do. i just assume that it is much easier to use the pen in my situation with a quick reaction time needed. I like the reviews of Lantus - highest remission possibility !!! Vet started me out on 2 units twice daily, but I have a feeling once we get a dose stabilized - it will be much higher. I am glad to get him off dry food and eating canned without much effort. ...Now just to get the 1st done - hopefully with some help with the new vet

 

The only pens that dose in 1/2 units increments are either:
- one that come prefilled with Caninsulin/Vetsulin. This a U40 insulin (40 units per ml) compared with hyman insulins which are U100 (100 units per ml) so using a human U100 syringe marked in 1/2 units each 1/2 unit marking is 0nly 0.2 units of the U40 insulin. Thus, one can does more accurately with syringes. Also Caninsulin/Vetsulin is made for dogs and does not usually work that well for cats
- There is the Novo Nordisk Echo and the Eli Lilly HumaPen Luxura pens that dispenses in 1.2 unit increments nut the insulin cartridges are only for fast acting insulins not really suitable for cats. Also, I do not even think the pens and cartridges are available in the USA

 

Hi. I am new to all of this as well. My cat was diagnosed two weeks ago with diabetes. The vet at first prescribed vetsulin and no home monitoring just come in for glucose tests. After finding this forum I showed the vet a lot of what I learned here and also showed up with meter and supplies.The situation turned around greatly.
I hope this can help I have tried to condense a lot of it all into one post. the rest of the info is here third post. http://www.felinediabetes.com/FDMB/threads/diabetic-cats.154977/

 

Hello,
I am quite new, too. I have the worst cat ever for injecting and testing. At first I had my husband or my children holding the cat while I was injecting. The cat would meow like crazy and would wiggle so much that it was almost impossible to inject. But I just forcefully did it and (after 1 month) today was the first day when he would let me test him without anyone holding him. I'm using 4mm Lantus pen needles. I have tried 8mm twice and both times it has hurt my cat so much that I wasn't able to inject. The bad thing about 4mm needles is that even if you hold the needle in for 10 seconds after injecting then you will still have a drop or two coming out after you have taken the needle out.

 

I don't want to hijack this welcome post (so perhaps you could start a new post on the Health board about this for advice), but we don't recommend using the Lantus pen needles because you can only give doses in whole units. Lantus needs to be adjusted in .25u-.5u increments, which you can't do with the pen needles. Giving the injection with the 8mm syringe shouldn't hurt your cat at all! What syringes were you using? Were they the 8mm, 3/10 ml, 31g syringes with half unit markings? Where/how were you giving the injection? Were you making sure you were injecting subcutanously (into the skin only), and not into the muscle?

I always have given Bandit's injections with the 8mm syringes while he eats and he's never even noticed that he's getting a shot.

 

I know that the probleem is that you can only use whole units and that is very bad and strongly not recommended. I was just talking about my cat's pain. Of course I am injecting the Same way with 4mm and with 8mm needles. I might order 6mm syringes and try with them.

 

You might find something helpful on this thread:

Testing and injection tips


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