Timing - Late or Early?

My husband and I are getting out for a special dinner tomorrow night - yay!! I'm curious about how best to time/adjust kitty's shot since we will be out during the normal time.

Normally we give him his dinner and shot between 7:30-8:00pm. Tomorrow night we will need to be leaving the house at 6:15pm and probably not back until 8:30 or 9:00pm. I planned to get a friend trained tonight to be our backup carer, but she needed to reschedule, so it will be a few more days before she's ready to help out.

Kitty is usually very hungry by about 7 or 7:30pm so I think we'll need to feed him at least a snack before we leave. His PMPS is usually in the yellow, even if we test him a bit early. If his BG is high enough around 6pm would it be ok to give his shot early? Maybe split up his dinner, half at 6pm and half when we get back?

Thanks!

 

Two hours early is likely too early. Let's see what Prozinc users have to say.

 

You don't want to give insulin over an hour early on ProZinc. If you have not given insulin this morning I would give at 8:00-8:30 and then give insulin when you get back tonight.

 

I'd vote for shooting late. Will you be able to adjust your schedule over the rest of the weekend to get back on schedule?

 

From the times you gave, you will only be about an hour late giving the shot if you wait until you return. You have an hour of 'play' time with ProZinc, so you could give it when you get back and still not have gotten off track much at all. The same rule would apply the other way, you could give the shot up to an hour early, as long as his glucose was high enough, but it sounds like you would have to give it more than an hour early, so I would go with giving it an hour late instead. Then, tomorrow morning, you could give it at your normal time, but ideally, I would slide it half an hour late to meet in the middle. Then, be back on regular schedule tomorrow evening.

I see that sometimes you are not able to test (migraines are no fun), but please be sure you do test no matter what before giving the shot in the morning if you give it at your regular time (which means it would really be an hour early if you give this evening's shot an hour late). And, I have to mention this... his glucose has not been running really high, and 2 units is not a tiny dose, so you will probably want to start getting some mid-cycle tests in to make sure the dose is not pushing him too low which is not only dangerous but can then push his glucose up (bounce) and create volatility and make it hard to be able to tell what is going on with him and whether his dose is too high or too low. On 11/21, he was 8.6 (155) at +10 which is really late in the cycle. A cat's lowest point on ProZinc is normally closer to mid-cycle, somewhere between +4 and +8, so he may have gone considerably lower during that cycle, then you see that he went up into the 19.1 (344) by the next shot time. It is possible his dose is a bit too high, but only getting mid-cycle tests will tell you for sure.

Enjoy your dinner! Oh, and it is fine to give him a snack right before you leave so he won't think he is starving to death when you are late giving him his normal meal.

 

Thanks everyone for your advice!

I decided to give his morning dose 30 minutes late today and then his evening shot after our dinner will be around the 12 hour mark. Will give him a snack around 6pm so he doesn't try to eat inedible things while we're gone We have actually been trying to gradually move his shot timings to 8-8:30 to give us a bit more freedom in the evenings, so this can be a catalyst for that change! We'll be sure to test him tomorrow morning AMPS.

And thanks @FurBabiesMama - we're trying to get more mid-cycles every weekend so should have more in the next few days. It's been a rough week at our house so just starting to get back on track now. We got one mid-cycle last night but need to get more in the +4 and +8 range without the interference of snacks. Thanks for your support!