Previously: https://felinediabetes.com/FDMB/threads/01-30-buddym-amps-83-2-71.242333/ Blue AMPS again this morning. Pretty consistent with his numbers before the drop dose. I'm feeling more confident about the drop being delivered now after holding the syringe in for 5-10 seconds. Although not seeing much of an effect of the dose on the numbers yet I might try feeding again earlier tomorrow to get the AMPS down. Except if you think to hold off for longer @Marje and Gracie?
Thanks Elise! His little body seems to work well with food. But it's tricky because he's still overweight and I can't really focus on the weight until I have confidence in his bg numbers.
It’s worth a try. I just remember Jill saying over and over that it takes 3-4 hours for the pancreas to bring the BG down in a cat but maybe Buddy didn’t read any of Jill’s posts The other option is to be patient but it really shouldn’t take more than a cycle or two for a one drop depot to build. He doesn’t even really need a depot! The last option which we should just try a couple different things from above but, he’s losing duration. That means the insulin is not getting all the way in or he’s not absorbing it. At some point....just putting the possibility out there....we might need to think about 0.1u.
Lol, yeah he may not have read those posts. From observing Buddy, it looks like food sends him down pretty quick. Look at 1/13 AMBG 193, and +1.5 was 68. I'm not opposed to trying 0.1 because trying to battle the dawn numbers with food is very difficult. And with as much as Buddy loves food I'm a little afraid of him getting used to food in the middle of the night. Let me mull it over a bit today. Thank you for your input!
I think I want to try something. I read here: https://dtc.ucsf.edu/types-of-diabe...d-therapies/type-2-insulin-rx/insulin-basics/ 'At mealtime, a little insulin is released even as you are first smelling or chewing the food.' I know this is for humans. But I want to try the autofeeder tonight and see if when it opens at say 4/5am if he can start smelling the food. The previous times I got up and brought the food into the bedroom for him to eat. But maybe if he smells it for a while it could even trigger some insulin being released. Long shot but want to try this tonight.
It won’t hurt but Buddy, however, if you read on after that sentence, he states: Buddy is not the first cat we’ve had like this If it were this simple, we would have already figured that out. It’s not that uncommon to see this happen as the AMPS is always the last number to come down. We just have to figure out what works for Buddy. I really admire that you are looking for solutions, too. Brainstorming is always good!!!!
I don't really understand how that quoted bit is applicable to Buddy? I read it as meant for diabetics who's pancreas aren't producing insulin. So they need to mimic the natural insulin release from the pancreas with insulin. I think it's pretty clear that Buddy's pancreas are responding to food with insulin, right? Looks like the quote didn't appear in my message.. 'The situation is different when you have diabetes and are getting insulin replacement therapy. You have to calculate how much carbohydrate you are going to eat and how much insulin you will need. And you have to try to mimic natural overnight, fasting (or between meals) and mealtime insulin release with injected insulin.'
In the sentence you quoted, that is how endogenous (natural) insulin works in a non diabetic. However, for a diabetic receiving exogenous insulin, it doesn’t work the same way because with these long-lasting insulins, there is insulin always a little insulin(and sometimes alot depending on the dose) present in the depot. I should have only quoted the first part of that because the stuff after on calculating carbs to eat, etc and mimicking fasting, etc. doesn’t apply. Sorry about that!!
Ok, sorry. We are sitting down to dinner and since we have a path forward, I’ll try to reword it later. Apologies!
No problem. Just confused. It seems like you're saying that because he's receiving the exogenous insulin he will not respond with his own endogenous insulin. But surely that can't be right?
You are correct...I’m not saying that. I’m speculating that because of the exogenous insulin which is already present, the smell of something doesn’t kick off an insulin response which is different than a response to ingested food.
Okay gotcha. But it's not what the article is saying though. They're just distinguishing response in people that are producing their own insulin versus people that aren't. In general. Because Buddy does seem to be producing his own insulin when eating, it's worth a shot to see if smelling food will trigger it too no? Of course I'm not expecting anything dramatic. Also the hope is that if it's a background smell he may actually become interested in eating as well. We'll see how it goes tonight.
I read it differently....comparing no diabetics to diabetics receiving insulin. At any rate, as I indicated before, your experiment is absolutely fine. Remember that we will be looking for repeatability if it helps.
Same. I just said 'people producing their own insulin' instead of non diabetics. And 'people who aren't' instead of diabetics receiving insulin. So now I still don't know what you're saying?! lol I must be missing something. The bit you quoted earlier is just saying that diabetics on insulin are trying to mimic the natural ebb and flow of insulin response in non diabetics. It doesn't say receiving insulin is cancelling out any action or response of working pancreas as far as I can see.
Thank you. I will be anxious to see what your little guy does. Maybe letting him watch his bird videos early will get that insulin going! Come on, Buddy!!!
Thank you! I can't say I have super high expectations that this will work, but we'll see if his food interest get piqued. If not we can increase the dose a bit. It's too bad that my shot time is falling right when his dawn phenomenon is roaring. So I'm getting peak insulin action where I don't really want it.
True that we’d like to have his insulin such that he’s fairly flat all day. When the BG drops early in the morning and the regulatory hormones then cause sugar to be released to bring the BG back up, it’s just as he’s getting to the end of any duration he might have gotten from the night’s shot. I feel certain he will overcome that at some point if we just give him some support.
