Hello, my cat was recently diagnosed as diabetic and has been on prozinc for about a little over a week now. I ended up leaving my prozinc bottle out and im 99% sure it went bad (i see little particles). As the title suggests the vet isnt open until monday. Is there any looming danger i should be immediately concerned about? Shes on 1 unit as of now
I only have the initial numbers from her visit which if i remember correctly was in the 300s? The vet never mentioned anything about dka and looking it up nothing i read about it has really applied to her
Oh you would know if your kitty had DKA. She would have been very ill and hospitalized. I would like to say that it’s very important for you to start testing her blood glucose levels at home to prevent a hypoglycemic event which can be deadly. That sounds awful, I know. I’m sorry. I’m not trying to be alarming, I just want to protect your cat and you. We do see hypos here among people’s cats. We never want that. You can easily We can really help you a lot with everything. Home testing, dosing methods that are safe, moral support, etc. In the short term, since you said you saw particles in the insulin, I would not use it. How long was it out of the refrigerator for?
12 hours, and the room it was in was quite warm 75-80 degrees. Glucose testing at home is something the vet mentioned but didnt really inform me on since we're still figuring out her dosage
I got contact with my vet (though not the one previously mentioned) who said I should use it tomorrow then get a new vial asap on monday. Is this sound advice? Hes not the one i met with for my cat's diagnosis and i cant find much on whether or not its safe to use prozinc when its gone bad from temperature.
Usually that won’t be enough to spoil the insulin. I’m sorry. I’m sure you have spent enough money already!
I’m attaching the sticky note from the ProZinc forum on insulin care and handling. It says not to use the insulin if it is cloudy or has particles. Personally, I would not use it if it looks like this. Did they tell you about not shaking the vial but to gently roll the vial on the countertop? . https://felinediabetes.com/FDMB/thr...inge-info-proper-handling-and-drawing.225856/
Thank you for the link, it was very informative. A lot of the things, including the rolling of the vial were not told to me. Is there anything about what will happen if I do use the prozinc and is there a possibility that leaving it in the fridge overnight will cause it to "unspoil"?
If it is spoiled, and I can’t see it, I don’t see how it counts unspoil. Since she has lived for a while now with untreated diabetes, I would not use it in my cat. I would not take the chance.
Thank you for your input. The vet said that leaving it out will cause it to lose effectiveness but not necessarily cause it to go bad and that is why he still recommends using it until im able to get a new vial on monday. Im not sure im going to use it, i will see how she behaves through the night and whether or not the particles in the vial disappear after refrigeration. Also I wanted to specifiy that i dont believe she was dealing with untreated for diabetes for a particularly long time. She developed diabetes within the last year (this i know for sure as she got bloodwork last year and came back with nothing) and specifically started showing symptoms at the beginning of this year.
Here is the info I got from calling the manufacture. Prozinc Call 11-1-22 Melissa is who I talked to and she said that the insulin can sit out on the shelf as long as the temp is below 76 degrees and the bottle is protected from the light. It not the ideal way to store it but if you have no power this is okay to store it this way just protect it from light. She suggested that it stays in the box it comes in if it sits out on the counter or shelf. She did say it is best to use within 60 days of puncture but she said they have heard that some vets said it would be okay to use up to 6 months. But she did not recommend using it that long.
