? My Sabrina is blind

Hi Guys/Gals,

My cat Sabrina who is 17 years old has been on Lantus now for about 3 years and is fairing as well as can be expected having stage 3 renal failure as well . She is on a very low dose of Lantus, only half a unit. Most days I can only give it to her once a day because she goes too low if administered twice a day. It seems now she is nearly totally blind. Is this a side effect of diabetes and is this a permanent condition?

Thanks

Brad.

 

Hi Brad,
I am so sorry Sabrina is having trouble with her sight.
A couple of things. Are you home testing the blood sugar? If Sabrina is going too low if given Half a unit twice a day, it would be better for her to have a quarter of a unit twice a day than half a unit once a day. Lantus works best if given twice a day 12 hours apart.

Does Sabrina have high blood pressure? Cats who have renal failure often have high blood pressure. Cats can loose their eye sight from too high blood pressure. There are medications cats can take to reduce the blood pressure....ask your vet. I had a cat many years ago who went totally blind from high blood pressure but she managed very well without her sight. So well I fact that I did not know she was blind for ages after she was. She lived several more years and died at age 21 years.

If you test the blood sugar would you consider recording the results on a spreadsheet here and experienced people can help you manage both the diabetes and the renal failure. Here is a link to the spreadsheet set up.
http://www.felinediabetes.com/FDMB/threads/fdmb-spreadsheet-instructions.130337/

 

Long-term diabetes does tent to cause cataracts that can reduce vision. However, renal failure frequently causes high blood pressure which can result in retina detachment that causes blindness. If the high blood pressure is rectified quickly, vision can at least be partially restored.

 

Take her to the vet, per the posts above - high blood pressure is a more likely cause of the vision loss and quick treatment may restore some sight as well as preventing other complications of high blood pressure, such as stroke or heart disease.

 

Thanks guys for the quick and detailed responses.
I do a sugar curve myself every so often now that the Vet trusts me which is a lot less stressful for Sabrina being dragged to the vet for the day.
We take Sabrina to the Vet every 3 months for a urine test to test for Creatins or something like that. Most times she has a urinary tract infection which means she has to go on antibiotics and then retested again. So far she hasn't had high blood pressure in all these tests. I asked the Vet about her blindness and she said their was no visible cataract problems.
Sabrina is also a very fussy eater so we cannot adhere to a strict diabetic or renal diet which I think oppose each other any way so we add Ipakitine which is a phosphorous binder to her food.
I'll do a sugar curve and post the details. None of the links in this message regarding the spreadsheet work. They just take me to Google drive which I don't have.

Thanks fellow cat lovers.

 

Hi Brad. Before you can set up your spreadsheet you'll need to set up a Google account, if you don't already have one. Once you have created a Google account go back to the spreadsheet link and follow the instructions, it shouldn't be a problem then. Good luck! I hope you and/or your vet can find the cause of Sabrina's blindness.

 

Hi Brad, just wanted to say Welcome to you and Sabrina.

 

I've had 3 nondiabetic elderly cats go blind, one had cataracts the other two did not, none had high blood pressure although all 3 had CRF. They were 20, 19, and 17 years old. I had another cat who was diabetic, was given Humulin U insulin for 1 year, and Lantus for 5 years, he did not go blind.
For what that bit of info is worth...!

 

My new vet told me about cataracts with diabetic cats and it is something we have to stay on top of with just one eye now. He said it can be treated.

 

Thanks everyone,

Sounds like the reason for Sabrina's blindness is her renal failure. So looks like a permanent condition then unfortunately :-(
I'll talk to the Vet more about it next week when she has to go for her 3 monthly visit.
Oh yeah, how on earth can you accurately give a 0.25 unit of insulin? I have enough problems giving 0.5 which probably could be only 0.25.

Thanks

Brad

 

A lot of people once they get down to small doses use calipers. I have had no experience with them but here is a thread which you should find helpful. I will tad @Marje and Gracie and @Tricia & Cinco as they may know where you can buy them. I know people get them online and say they are very good.

http://www.felinediabetes.com/FDMB/threads/dosing-with-calipers-updated-w-videos.79851/#post-1518564

 

Hi Brad.

Welcome.

I didn't buy my calipers, unfortunately. We inherited Zener's. They sell them on Amazon. Perhaps some of the people that use them regularly can give you a recommendation for them.

Are you using syringes with 1/2 unit markings? They make it much easier to give both the .5 unit dose and the .25. You haven't mentioned where you live. If it's Australia, I believe they aren't available there, but in the US and Canada you can get them at Walmart.

What foods have you tried with Sabrina? If it's just the prescription foods that the vet tries to sell you, I'm not surprised she doesn't like them. Most of us here use Dr. Lisa's Food Chart to choose foods. You want to look for something that is under 10% carbs and the lowest level you can find that she'll eat on the Phosphorus. Have you been to Tanya's site? There is a ton of great info there on CRF, including a low phosphorous food list. It also shows the carb%, but it's not alphabetical, so it's a little harder to work with.

My Cinco is also blind - glaucoma and ocular lymphoma caused it about 18 months ago. He's diabetic and has early kidney disease. I feed him Weruva, Evo, Dave's, Wellness and Merrick Perfect Bistro canned foods and his kidney numbers have been stable for months. His BGs are a little wonky right now, as he's had a recurrence of his lymphoma and just completed radiation treatments, but before that he was very well regulated on these foods.

We are happy to have you join us here at FDMB. You will find a LOT of info on FD in the stickies at the top of the Lantus & Levemir page, and many helpful, caring, knowledgeable people to answer your questions on this Board.

 

Thanks Bron, Sheba, Tricia and Cinco,

Lol I hope I captured some human names in their who I am talking too?

Yep I'm from the land of plenty but unfortunately not for any specific things such as diabetic cat needs, we don't even have Walmart and are restricted from buying anything from Amazon. I'm using the BD Ultra Fine 11 syringe which is 0.3ml 0.25mm(31G) *8. It has steps of 1 unit intervals, this is the best thing with the thinnest needle I can get for my cat living in North Queensland.

I'll have a look at the calipers, I'm still a bit confused.

Sabrina is so fussy I have tried everything from buying crab, lobster and prawns, although she does like prawns for a little while. In the end she just prefers her usual Fancy Feast broths for breakfast which are like a soup with Tuna, Surimi and Prawn bits in them. For diner she likes minced meat blend, which is probably beef, roo and chicken. I'd rather give her what she wants and put the Phosphorous binder in her food and have limited the dry food which she use to love before she was diagnosed diabetic.

Sounds like your cat Cinco Trisha is doing it a bit tuff too but obviously from all your love and good parenting they are still purring along happily ;-)

I'll look up some of these useful links everyone has given me.

Thanks Brad

 

Brad.....I didn't realise you were from Australia!
I live in Sydney. And the human names are Tricia and Bron
I use the same insulin needles as you do .......we can't get the half unit marked ones out here.
I use a magnifying glass to check the dose each time...maybe you could try that. Otherwise look into calipers.
It would be much better for Sabrina to have insulin twice a day. By getting her blood sugars under control you are helping the kidneys.

 

We get our calipers at Harbor Freight but any digital calipers work....I’m sure you can get them at some hardware store in Australia.