Acromegaly - just diagnosed UK

Hi folks, I posted in the main forum about my seemingly diabetic cat 'Rebus' - the thread is here viewtopic.php?f=28&t=117012

Apologies for the cut and paste from that thread, but it covers the salient points. I think.

I'll cut a long story short: the vet has now diagnosed Rebus as having acromegaly. He's currently on 20 units twice a day of caninsulin (only for the last week) in an effort to see if we can dent his glucose. Readings after a dose of 10 units still showed figures in the 30's - I believe we're looking for single figures although the vet will settle for low teens.

We've been supplied with an alphatrak meter and schooled in it's use by the vet nurse. I have now succesfully drawn and tested his blood quite easily.

I'll try to get a proper curve done this weekend and then discuss that with the vet. He's quite open to trying other insulin but feels he needs to see something approaching a curve from the caninsulin before moving to an alternative.

Rebus seems ok- he can certainly fight his corner when it comes to getting an injection, I have the scars to prove that.... ;-)

 

With Acromegaly, you're going to want the longest lasting insulin you can possibly use - and that would be Levemir. Lantus has an acidic pH and can sting in high doses. Caninsulin may peter out at +10 or sooner; if you have to stick with that, can you shoot about every 8 hours (TID)?

Also, you may find that it still wears off at the end of the cycle and that you may need to use a booster of shorter acting insulin (R) to bring that period down, as well as to help hold it down while the longer acting insulin kicks in. Think of it like chinking a log house - you fill in the gaps between the logs the way you'll fill in the gaps between the main insulin doses.

 

Do you mean spread the daily dose over 3 injections rather than the current 2? I could cope with that I think.

As we've been unable to get any meaningful curve up until now - due to his resistance - then I'm optomistic that when (if?) I can collate some data from home testing we can explore the alternatives with the vet. He seems quite open to alternatives but wants to see data first. That doesn't seem unreasonable.

It might also help us out that another vet in the same practice is treating an acro cat just now and they're a little further on in the process than we are. I don't know what insulin that guy is on but I'm encouraged that they have experience to share amongst the practice.

 

Yes, I mean shoot every 8 hours by taking the total daily dose and dividing it into 3 equal portions to be given as close as reasonably possible.

Now that he has the diagnosis, I think you should seriously investigate using Levemir.

Have you found the Facebook Acromegaly page yet?

Actually, there appear to be about 4:
https://www.facebook.com/groups/acromegaly/
https://www.facebook.com/groups/68039236605/
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Feline-Acromegaly/182581725165745
https://www.facebook.com/groups/200919730033567/

 

Thanks.

I'm up and running on the FB group as of today.

 

Hi Nick - I hope things are going well. There are a number of us with acrocats over on the Tight Regulation Forum, so that's another source of information for you if you are interested. We don't post on this forum much, it's mostly for information.

I hope you get a chance to try Levemir, or even Lantus. We have some cats with between 20-30 units on Lantus and it doesn't seem to sting them. Neko was on Lantus when she was a higher doser, but I switched to Levemir later. We were originally on Caninsulin - it didn't work very well as it petered out too quickly and make Neko miserable before dinner.