Bald Spots on Ears?

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toomanycats

toomanycats

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Has anyone else had their diabetic cat start to develop bald spots/hair loss on their ears?

I'm not sure if it's the neosporin (I do use it every day sometimes multiple times a day - not the one with pain relief though)? the amount of pressing/rubbing I do to try to get blood out? ...am I doing something wrong?
 
Deb's right. Sometimes I do rub the ear gently toward the drop, but you don't want to squeeze or get your fingers to close to the drop. If you don't get a good bead, there's things you can try. Warm the ear first. Use a thin film of Vaseline before you poke. A sock with a little rice in it, warmed slightly in the microwave to warm the ear will help. A larger gauge lancet can help. Doing a second lancing right next to the first can help.

Are you testing the inside of the ears? Is the lancet going all the way through? If it's going all the way through, that might make the fur drop out around the puncture. The neosporin should be fine, I wouldn't think that would be an issue unless he's allergic. Any redness, or just bald spots?
 
it's fur loss, not redness.
I do warm his ear, the neosporin is 'vaseline-like,' so I do that too, and I use a 26-gague lancet. I'll have to try lancing twice next to one another. It took 3 lances this morning to get enough and he was not happy
Lancet sometimes goes all the way through (I've grabbed blood from inside his ear when that happened), but normally it does come up to the surface ... it's just not enough. I've errored through a zillion strips
 
toomanycats said:
it's fur loss, not redness.
I do warm his ear, the neosporin is 'vaseline-like,' so I do that too, and I use a 26-gague lancet. I'll have to try lancing twice next to one another. It took 3 lances this morning to get enough and he was not happy
Lancet sometimes goes all the way through (I've grabbed blood from inside his ear when that happened), but normally it does come up to the surface ... it's just not enough. I've errored through a zillion strips
Click to expand...

Just one thing to possibly consider - another meter/strips combo. Some take smaller blood drops than others. I tried several different kinds before I landed on one I liked. I used a Relion from Walmart until they discontinued the strips and then purchased several others and found that most of them, especially the Relion Premier required too big of a blood drop. Luci has black ears and black fur and sometimes the drop just isn't very big. I ended up with the OneDrop - it's a subscription based system - let me know if you want more info about that.
 
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