New member.

Hi
My name is Jerry, I live in So. Ca. with 6 parrotlets and my cat Rascal. I took Rascal to the vet the 8th of this month for routine check-up. Tests showed he has diabetes. His number was close to 600. After doing much reading and help from the yahoo group, I have received some good information but still everything is new to me. Rascal will be 14 next month. He is not over weight, he has always had dry food and wet sometimes as a treat. The vet put him on 2 units of Lantus once a day, and I have taken him off dry foods and he is eating the wet Friskies. The vet did do a full day of monitoring him, but Rascal gets so stressed going there.I understand that he needs a high protein, low carb. diet. I have been doing random testing on him just to see at different times where his number is. It seems that Rascal has a low number in the evening after his dinner. The last test was at 94, about 7:30p.m. This morning after he eat, I did a test and he was at 159 and that was 24 hours since his shot. I was wondering if there is a cut off for giving him his insulin, such as a low number since I would hate to have his number go to low. How often should he he be tested? I don't want to put him in harm by not giving him is insulin, or by giving him the insulin when he really doesn't need it. I have not given him his shot as of yet.
Any information will sure help.
Jerry

 

HI Jerry this is Paige :mrgreen: I am glad you came here to check things out!!! Ok, I need to read your message now. You will get lots of input here I promise. Welcome :YMHUG:


Edited to add: Well it seems unusually quiet right now. Figures :roll:

 

Edited - removed because Jerry answered these questions in the post.

 

Hi and welcome!

When someone is first starting out with insulin and/or testing, a general cutoff is 200 for insulin or no insulin. That said, there are always shades of grey and different option. I think it is section 4.3 of the faq says when you get a lower than usual preshot, you have various options, but with this its a bit different. I'd suggest that you stick to 180-200 and consider lowering your dose as well. Then, if he gets 180ish for one or two tests in a row (hours apart), consider giving a very reduced dose if you are able to monitor for awhile.

also consider posting in the lantus insulin support group for more personalized support, as with lantus there is a concept of building up a storage shed (you'll have to read their stickies) that I'm not quite good enough at explaining

 

The general rule for newly diagnosed cats is to not shoot if the BG measured before a scheduled shot is below 200. Lantus is almost always dosed twice a day. It would be nice if once a day dosing worked. Based on your numbers, 1 unit twice a day may be too much especially considering you have changed to canned food.

You shot test at least before every scheduled shot. If for some reason that BG is very low and you gave a full dose, that could lead to too low a bg (hypoglycemia) and bod complications and even death. Periodically you shot do a curve which is taking a BG about every too hours. That lets you know how low he is going so the dose can be adjusted as necessary.

 

You've taken him off dry completely? It's important now that you test more because just changing diet from dry to wet will lower BGs.

Also, Lantus is better utilized if given 2 times per day, not once per day. It's a long lasting insulin, but not that long.

 

Hi there

what exactly is your schedule?
7:30pm last nite - did u give a shot? did you monitor last nite by testing him in the evening?

Lantus works best on a 12/12 schedule,,,ie: so if your evening shot time is 7:30pm, your morning shot time would be 7:30am...we do advise that you get a preshot number, this will help determine if it is safe to shoot with the limited dat you have...and especially now that he is seeing lower numbers and you have taken dry food away, as wet food will drop some of those high numbers.

Would you be able to give any further information? Any other numbers?

 

hi Jerry & welcome!

whereabouts in so cal are you? i work in xxxx and live out in xxxx myself but there are several others on here in so cal with us too.

i've seen diet change alone drop BG levels as much as 100 pts soooooo i would encourage some more testing, maybe over the weekend for instance you can get some more numbers? also, as has been said, insulin is a twice a day hormone for our kitties. once in a great while a kitty comes along that is a once a day kitty but they usually are on their way to remission or still have some function of the pancreas happening.

lantus in a human is a once a day insulin so if your vet isn't too familiar with it and is just going off the paperwork included with a vial of it they are applying human treatment regimens to your kitty. unfortunately cats metabolize twice as fast as us thus the need for twice a day shots.

that being said though, and given the numbers you are seeing, i'm leaning towards your dose being too high for your cat, causing prolonged duration that isn't necessarily good, orrrrrr possibly your kitty doesn't need insulin at all given the diet change cause really those numbers are pretty dang good numbers.

 

Thanks everyone for the infor. I called my vet who is just down the street and she wants me to do testing every 4 hours so she will have some figures to work with. Rascal weights 12.5 pounds. When he went into the vet for monitoring to see what dose of Lantus worked for him, they gave him 1 unit with very little change. I took him back the next day and they gave him 2 units and kept him until that evening. His numbers went down but not much. The next day I tested him and he was at 300 in the morning. When I give him the insulin, I give him just the 2 units one time a day at 9:00a.m. The only other problem they said was he had high blood pressure ,I give him 1/4 of a Norvasc daily. They said his kidneys,heart,liver where all good. I am really wondering if Rascal maybe was just stressed at the vet and that showed the high number. I just moved from a house to an apt with him a week before I took him in, and during all the moving he was very stressed, just like he was 6 years ago when I moved from Vegas. At that time the vet said his number was a little high but that could be from the stress of the moving.So I am home all day today and will test him every 4 hours. His urine output has been good, not causing muddy litter, he is eating good. I guess the numbers today will tell.
Hi Cindy, I live real close to you. Right on the edge of Riverside, close to the bird farm.
Jerry

 

Stress from the move and stress from the vet's office could be why the numbers were high. Could be a transient diabetic. I'd want to home monitor carefully if it were my cat, to be safe.

Living close to Cindy is great, she's very knowledgable and I agree with her on the dose or possibly not needing the insulin, especially with the food change.

 

magnolia bird farm? wow! if so you are real close to me. you know where hidden valley & the 15 is? that big kohls store there? i live right there. and my fiance rides bicycles and it sounds like he rides right past you. he goes up to la sierra and goes up around lake matthews and stuff when he doesn't get down to brea and meet up with his ride group on the weekends.

as far as the way the dosing went, it still sounds like the vet doesn't know too too much about lantus. no problem though as a lot of vets are still learning about lantus and how well it's working in kitties. just a few years ago pzi was the greatest insulin on earth but it's been discontinued now so more are going the way of lantus these days.

one dose won't do much. it has to basically build up in the system to be it's most effective, that's why you want to shoot a dose and stick with it for a few days, see how it's doing with the numbers and then make increases in small increments like 1/2 a unit at a time, then hold for a few days, see what it does, and keep going like that.
see this for a better explanation than i can give
viewtopic.php?f=9&t=150

and for that matter here's some more info on lantus just in case
viewtopic.php?f=9&t=151
viewtopic.php?f=9&t=147

nice to have someone close. if you need help with anything sometime or petsitting or whatnot since i've been doing this for 3+ years and am real comfortable taking care of a diabetic kitty let me know k

 

Just curious, what tests did your vet do to diagnosed diabetes? Just the BG test? Urine test? Any blood work?

Sounds you lucked out having Cindy near by! This is good news!

 

The vet did a senior screen, I guess that is a general over all bleed test, and tested his urine. I went in for his blood work to have his teeth cleaned, he had the worst breath. They had me give him Clavamox Drops for any gum infection and his bad breath has cleared up. I just wonder if the vets really know what feline problems are and how to handle them. It seems like one will say something and another says something different. We really need a health care for our pets, they are family also. When I took Rascal in 6 years ago for shots,blood work and teeth cleaning, the vet at that time had me put him on Feline w/d dry food. To me, Rascal wasn't over weight, he is a big cat. I did call my old vet in Vegas and he also said he tells his patients that Lantus is given once a day, he said it is a longer lasting insulin.
Thats great Cindy that your close by, just in case. La Sierra is just the next street over from me. I am on Tyler and Indiana, down the street from the mall.My vet is on the corner of La Sierra and Indiana, and yes I know Hidden Valley and I 15. I go out to Tom's Farm alot to get fresh produce for my parrots.
I am so glad that there is a group like this to get answers and help. Thank you all.
Jerry

 

Hi there

Hope this isn't info overload...

Jen

 

yep, i know right where you are by the Galleria and ooooohhhh, tom's farms! reeeeally good produce there

let's see what your data collection shows for the next couple days and what happens with your vet and the numbers. your vet may work out just fine, who knows. personally i don't think vets are all bad but when they have to treat several different species i don't feel they can know all about each one of them and all the illnesses that go along with each. so we just must take a bit more of it on to ourselves is all and work with the vet if they are willing.

i have a really good vet, if you end up needing a recommendation someday, but she's down here in xxxx. she has saturday hours and is a cat only clinic, she's a fan of lantus, hometesting (although she thinks some of us go overboard with it ) and raw/low carb diets for kitties so i put up with the drive and do saturdays as much as i can for my kitties. i'd love to find someone closer to the house but i'm a bit resistant to change myself

 

When my cat was diagnosed I decided to change his diet totally first. He went from all dry to all canned and thankfully just the diet change has regulated his numbers. I have not had to put him on insulin at all and I am thankful for that. One day he may need it but not now.

 

Re: New member Rascal.

Hi all, sorry I haven't been on in awhile. My birds are breeding so with Rascal and the parrots I am quit busy. A update on Rascal. As of 2/26 he had his last shot of insulin, which was just 1 unit instead of 2. His diet from dry to canned foods have helped him alot. His numbers range from 87 to 162 in the mornings and then I take a evening test and he is around 126- 139. He is very active now, running throught the apt, growling as if he is playing with another cat. He eats about 1 can of food a day. Hears my alarm go off in the morning and runs in my room, jumps on the bed and makes sure I am awake because he wants his food and fresh water. The vet did finally agree with me that he may have just been stressed from the move. They still want to do a curve on him in a couple of weeks.But it makes me feel good that his numbers are down. He jumps into my lap in the morning to get tested. He is such a good boy. Lets just hope he stays this way and no more problems.
Thank you,
Jerry