? Switching from Caninsulin to Lantus

Hi

Lily is above renal almost all the time, although she does appear to be thriving now she's eating a lot more. She's a lot stronger too.

She is having a drop daily of between 8 and 10 mmol, with her nadir between +3.5 and +4 and then back up to over renal very shortly after that. My data isn't perfect but I don't think I'm seeing evidence of bouncing. I don't want to provoke a bounce by upping her dose when it seems to be in and out of her so quickly, I just want to keep her lower for longer and give her system a chance to become more independent.

I have Lantus available from my partner's brother, and I have syringes and calipers. My vet was unwilling to precribe Prozinc because she told me (incorrectly) that it was not reliably available. I'm looking for a vet around here who is supportive of a hands on approach but I'm not getting responses to my (very polite) emails asking for practice info, except one who wanted to see Lily and charge me £69 for an extended appointment to answer questions about their usual practice and views on home testing, LC food, longer acting insulins etc.

IF I were to switch her to Lantus myself, and I'm still just thinking about this, would I start her on 0.5iu BID?

Thanks

Liz

 

It would depend on what dose she was on when you made the switch. When switching to a new insulin, we take current dose into consideration.

 

She's on 0.5 BID now.

 

Yes....but you said you were still thinking about whether you were going to switch or not. If you've decided that you are going to switch now, you'd start with .5 of Lantus.

If you want to continue to think about it for awhile, it would depend on what dose you were on when you made up your mind to change....that's what I meant

 

Hi Elizabeth, and welcome to you and sweet Lily over here. I am one of several here who switched from Caninsulin to Lantus. My girl was much happier on Lantus, though I made the mistake of starting on too low a dose. Make sure you have the U-100 syringes for Lantus. Bonus for us, the needle was smaller that the U-40 for Caninsulin and that also made Neko happier.

 

Thanks Chris, I know, sorry if I'm being confusing. I feel like I haven't slept for three weeks! Just wanted to check it would be a direct swap.

 

Hi Wendy, thank you for having me! I have the u100 syringes, I just need to check the accuracy of the markings - waiting for batteries for the calipers.

Then I just need to decide if I'm brave enough to do this without a current vet. There's so much information and experience here I'm sure she'll be safer and live longer than under the previous vet (a high carb, high dose proponent).

 

Once I got China's script for Lantus, I never took her back to a vet for her diabetes. When it was time for her to have a dental, I "shopped around" to find a vet. I called several and just told them that I was looking for a new vet for my diabetic cat and would like to talk to the vet about how they handle their diabetic cat clients. 1 place never called me back, 1 called but they didn't have x-ray equipment for dentals but one finally called that sounded like she understood my concern, had the right equipment and answered most of my questions right.

That's how China got the last vet that would ever see her. When I took her in for anything else (like pre-dental exam/bloodwork, yearly exams, a nasty URI) I just said "she's on X units of Lantus and her blood glucose runs between Y and Z but today we're here for (fill in the blank)" and that was usually the end of the conversation.

IF anything life-threating were to happy with your baby, you'd probably end up in an ER vet you'd never seen before anyway, so telling them your cat's on Lantus wouldn't be any big deal.

It can be done! Lots of us have gone without the "help" of a vet when it came to the diabetes.

 

I switched from Vetsulin to Lantus and didn't tell my vet until I took Tyler for blood work. She had no problem with it at all. She as happy that I did.
I bought it from the Supply Closet here so there was no reason I needed her to
write me a script
I think you will be very happy with the Lantus

 

Thank you Chris, and Diane. I feel so much better about it. I'll start her on it tomorrow morning and no doubt be back with questions.