Mitsy's pre-insulin levels tonight - question

Hi everyone,

Firstly, thank you to all of you for being so welcoming and helpful!

Secondly, I started Mitsy's spreadsheet. I managed to test her after two hours of fasting (not sure what time she ate prior to that but I took away the food for two hours before I did this test) and she was at 263. She last had insulin at 6:45am (5u per the vet's instructions).

I know all of you have mentioned that 5u is an extremely high dose, and since I'm new to this, I'm wondering if I should lessen it tonight. From what I'm seeing, 263 isn't extremely high...it's not ideal, but it's not the worst.

Would you all recommend that I lessen the dose? Please see her attached spreadsheet (although I just started so I apologize that not much is on there). You will see I gave her 5u last night and tested two hours later and she was in the 70s. So it wasn't too low either.

She seemed to be perkier than usual (as of late) when I got home from work today, although she had urinated on the floor again. I just feel like she pees way more and all over the place when I go below 3.5u so maybe she does need the high dose...thoughts?

 

Good job on starting a spreadsheet! I found this on an info post on the Vetsulin forum: "With Caninsulin (Vetsulin) you may see the peak/nadir of the cycle at around 4 - 4.5 hours after the shot. But it may be earlier or later than this. It may occur as early as 3 hours after the shot, and as late as 7 hours after." So, it is very likely that she went even lower than that 79 that you got at +2. I am not going to advise on an exact dose since I have no personal experience with Vetsulin, but I would definitely lower the dose. Someone who knows Vetsulin will be along to help. The more test data you get, the easier it will be to know the impact the insulin is having and to decide what changes are needed.

 

That makes sense - I had figured that it would be lowest right after the shot and gradually increase, but I see I was incorrect!

 

I am by no means an expert, but my vet started Grandpa at 2 units of Vetsulin. He was a little lethargic in the beginning so we dropped down to 1U for a few weeks and then went back up to 2U. We're still there. We had some pretty big swings at first where we went from the high 300s to below 100 a couple of times. As long as we could stay in the 200s he seems to feel good.

He has some other major medical issues so it's hard to figure what comes from the diabetes and what is attributable to other things, but 5U still seems high as an early user.

 

5 units is way too much. Most likely your cat was hypo with that 5 units. He was 79 with 3 or 4 hours left to drop. Personally I would reduce to 2 units for a few days and see what his numbers are. It can always be raised if need be.

 

Thank you for the information. I went down to 4u tonight before I saw this because her dose was due but I am going to do less tomorrow. I'm going to test her in a couple of hours to see what it's at as well. I just feel bad for her little ears, she cries every time.

 

Where are you poking the ear? If you do it between the vein and the edge, it should not really hurt. If you hit the vein, it's a different story.

 

I am trying to do between the vein and the edge, it just seems like her vein is right on the edge I'll have to try to make sure it's not hitting the vein next time. Maybe that's the problem.

 

Have you seen this? http://www.felinediabetes.com/FDMB/threads/hometesting-links-and-tips.287/

 

Yes, I had watched a couple of the videos, but I'm going to rewatch them again. Thank you!

 

I think I'm going to shine a flashlight the next time I do it!

 

Be sure to carefully watch her tonight so that she doesn't go hypo.

 

I just did her pre-insulin test after her two hour fasting, and she was at 218 (even lower than yesterday). I gave her 4u this morning - should I go down to 3u? I am off the next two days...maybe I should even go down to 2u and take it from there, since I will be testing her more regularly the next four days?

I feel so bad, I shined the flashlight under her ears and they are all bruised. I wasn't going far enough to the edge, I feel so bad for her because of my incompetence

 

I'd do 2.

 

I agree with Janet. I'd give 2 u for a couple of days. You can increase carefully from there if necessary.