Struggling to Make Sense of BG Numbers

Hi -

I've been home testing Peppy for about a month now and her numbers seem to be all over the place and I'm having trouble making sense of her BG numbers. She has had abnormally low pre-shots as well as sky high numbers at +7.

Could there be other factors that explain the erratic readings or do we need to be more patient?

Thanks!

 

I’ll let others chime in, but I think there were a few days when she was too low to shoot so she may be bouncing after a low BG. Like the day she was 37 that took her super close to hypo and she should not have had a shot. The days when the preshots were blue are also kind low and it may have been best to have given her a token doses.

you also seem to be increasing and decreasing by .5 not .25 units. Do you have 1-2 unit marked syringes?

hang on for more replies

 

I know it goes against SLGS, but our vet knows we're home testing and when I asked her what number was too low to shoot she said that as long as we're giving food with insulin, the BG will go up and we can still shoot. That's why were were giving insulin even with low numbers. I know people will disagree, but happy to hear feedback.

 

I'm glad you lowered the dose. Looks like she's bouncing from overdoses. On an alphatrak you don't wanna see that number go below 68!

 

This is what my vet said today. It seems the vets don't worry about the hypoglycemia for diabetic cats. Not sure why.

 

what?? We've had more then a few have emergencies and even deaths due to numbers like you saw (37 is SUPER low and really dangerous. You are luck there were no seizures. My cat was in the same boat this week.)

 

I hear ya both because I had a vet that acted the same way and said that Lantus is a long lasting insulin and cats can’t go into comma on it as opposed to other insulins, but it’s not science and it’s not true. I wish their licenses were revoked. I truly do

 

Yes! I asked the vet what if I get a pre-shot number as 100+. He said to feed the cat. As long as the cat eats, I can go ahead and give him the insulin shot!

I had to say: well, we will test every time before the shot. If the number is too low and we feel uncomfortable, we may skip the shot or reduce the dose.

 

with Lantus they can shoot at lower numbers like that, but not prozinc... it works differently.

 

Ya know? The more I read about these horror stories from Vets it makes me feel incredibly lucky to have the Vet we had. She was all on board with home testing, and basically just let me do what I wanted. I gave her FDMB link and she loved the way we all helped each other. She in turn gave the address to other clients.

 

my first vet flat out said... some choose to test, most don't... and then told me what to look for in a hypo. I wish she had pushed it more. My second vet told me that i test too much and the cat would not want to be near me. So i recorded myself testing her and she couldn't believe that my cat truly didn't care. Not long after she asked me for a link to my video to share with other new patients.

 

My vet said if I tested everyday I’d drive myself crazy and that you adjust the dose based on behavior not the numbers