? Nausea after Caninsulin Shots?

Hi all,

I was wondering if you ever noticed your kitty getting nauseous after administering Caninsulin shots?

We are quite new to this craziness, after 6 weeks of drama on Glargine and 3 DKA incidents, Allie was switched to Caninsulin and her blood glucose has been getting more stable. Within 2 week, her daily average went from 440 to 310.

However, I have noticed that since we stopped giving her Cerenia for nausea, she has been feeling under the weather after her shots. She hides in the bathroom, she purrs to herself, and she threw up few times. This morning, I woke up to a total disaster on the bathroom floor - she was sick at least 3 times at night. I also noticed she had been suffering from some mild diarrhea for the past few days.

Otherwise, her eating is fine, she drinks like a normal cat, her body weight is increasing (she became underweight as a result of the DM). She is also quite perky before her shots.

What do you do in such situations? Our vet will extend her Cerenia treatment for sure to buy her some time to adjust to new medication.

Thank you in advance!

 

Hi Marta,

Sometimes a particular insulin may not agree with a particular cat. Your comments above really grabbed my attention because Caninsulin did not agree with Saoirse and I observed similar clinical signs. She would be fairly good in herself just before a dose was given, get very lethargic and withdrawn for the next 9-10 hours and brighten up again a little while before her next dose was due. As I said to our main vet at the time, it was like having two different cats. Some other caregivers have reported similar reactions in their cats. If Allie is purring to herself for comfort then it's something

Saoirse also started to vomit after she started treatment with Caninsulin and had a bad pancreatitis flare not long after (both FD and pancreatitis were diagnosed at the same time, BTW). The treating vet at the time of Saoirse's FD Dx insisted that she only be fed twice a day but Saoirse would start to vomit about 3½ hours after her preshot feed. The vet treating her at the time was totally unsympathetic to this and again insisted that she stick to the 2x/day feeding schedule. I found this situation completely untenable and I started splitting Saoirse's food allowance for each cycle so that she would get something to eat every 3 hours (1/3 at PS time, 1/3 at +3 and 1/6 each at +6 and +9 hours). This stopped the vomiting but not the lethargy, depression and withdrawal.

We switched to a different veterinary practice not long after Saoirse's Dx. Over the next couple of months I recorded her clinical signs alongside her BG. Here's her spreadsheet for the period in question; it might be helpful to you in terms of things to look out for:

Saoirse's Spreadsheet - 2014

It got to the stage where Saoirse would try to hide in the most inaccessible place she could find in an effort to avoid her Caninsulin injections. Thankfully our new vet was able to switch Saoirse to Lantus insulin. The difference was like night and day. Saoirse would get a little bit sleepy for an hour or so after each Lantus dose was administered but thereafter she was a much brighter, much happier cat.

Without any BG data to look at for Allie I can't offer any suggestions other than that you might look at whether she is having steep/fast BG drops and rises on the Caninsulin (very common due to its action profile) and also whether she might be going too low mid-cycle.

If Allie doesn't show improvement in clinical signs then it might be an idea to discuss switching to an insulin with a gentler action profile than Caninsulin with your vets. I know from your earlier posts that there have been issues with different insulins but hopefully as Allie continues to regain her lost weight her BG levels will become stable enough to support a switch.

Needless to say, with Allie's history I'm assuming that as part of her regular daily monitoring routine you're checking daily for ketones (another common cause of nausea issues - as you unfortunately know only too well). Be sure to keep us posted on Allie's progress.


Mogs
.

 

Hello Mogs,

I just wanted to thank you for your short-lived but generous support for Allie. She passed away yesterday morning, I was holding her paw when she drew her last breath....

She died from complications related to her surgery. She was hospitalized with another DKA, but was diagnosed with an advanced stomach ulcer as well (this was contributing to her instability). She had to undergo an anesthesia to uncover this and she succumbed to low blood pressure we could not control...

She was our little Miss Sunshine. In nine years of her being with us, she made a miraculous transformation from a little Street Thug to a Love Bug... We will miss her dearly. Her remains will be cremated this week but her memory will live on with me and my husband forever.

Sending you Love & Hope,
Marta

 

I'm so sorry you've lost your precious girl.

 

What sad news! I'm sorry for your loss.

 

So sorry to hear this... it's so hard to lose our fur babies. Sending hugs your way. May your baby rest gently now.