Help with regulating please.

Status
Not open for further replies.
Betchadeb

Betchadeb

Member Since 2016
I was wondering if someone could look at Skylar's spread sheet and let me know how to get her blood sugars within a normal range. She is now completely on answers raw diet with goats milk and loving it. Thanks so much.
 

Attachments

Why was does raised from 2 to 2 1/2 units? The data in the SS does not support an increase.
For several entries not does is listed. Was no dose given?
 
For some reason the old spread sheet is showing. Don't understand that but I will try to go in and fix that later on tonight. Skylar has been home from the vets since the 16th. She came home taking 2 units of vetsulin at 7:30 pm and again at 7:30 am after eating her food. On the 17th at 7:30 pm her glucose was 322 so I gave her 2 1/2 units of vetsulin and tested her at 10:58 pm and her glucose was 96. That is perfect if it is true that a cats glucose is the same normal range as a humans. She was on 1 can of fancy feast in the am and 1 can in the pm. She is now completely switched over to answers raw diet with goat milk now. I currently have her on 2 1/2 units in the am and pm as her sugars are higher. Sugar was 292 on my reli on meter this morning Sunday 9/25/2016, so in reality it was really 392 as I compared the alpha trak from the vets office to mine and it came up around 100 points off. At 1:05 this afternoon her sugar was 110, so really 210- which is high. I will test again tonight at 7:30 when I feed her. Any suggestions will be truly appreciated. I almost wonder if I should have left her on fancy feast? I just thought that the raw diet would be better for her?
 
You can't do comparisons on human and pet meters in that way, we know human meters read lower than pet meters and all that is taken into account when we look at the numbers and the guidance on the site. If you use the Relion then that is fine as we know how to interpret the numbers according to the meter used, but don't try to convert to what it might be on an alphatrak as it doesn't work that way.
 
There is no conversion from a pet meter to a human meter. At lower BG there is less difference between human and pet meter with the human meter reading lower.
Can you post the BGs in this format using the actual BG value
AM PS =BG before morning shot, give dose of insulin. Then give subsequent BG in format +x BG where x is the time in hours after shot
PM PS = BG before even shot
Betchadeb said:
On the 17th at 7:30 pm her glucose was 322 so I gave her 2 1/2 units of vetsulin and tested her at 10:58 pm and her glucose was 96.
Click to expand...
A BG of 96 on a human meter after 3 1/2 hours is cutting close since lowest on Vetsulin is 4-6 hours
 
I will post it that way in a bit Larry and kitties. I thought that I had every thing completely loaded in the spread sheet and then when I looked at it I saw that it was not, I am sorry but I am technically challenged. When the vet let me use her alpha trak until I bought the reli on, a lot of the readings where almost at 100 points difference, that is why I am using this difference. I wish I could afford the strips for the alpha trak, but I just cant, so this is why I bought the reli on. On Monday, 9/19/2016 at 11:45 am, 4 1/4 hours after her insulin shot, her glucose was 180 on the alpha trak and 79 on the reli on. 79 is a tad on the low side and 180 is on the high side, I know that these are 2 different machines and her actual sugar was 180 which was high if it is true that a cats normal glucose numbers are like humans. 70 -120 is normal for a human and every human is different.
 
Larry and Kitties said:
There is no conversion from a pet meter to a human meter. At lower BG there is less difference between human and pet meter with the human meter reading lower.
Can you post the BGs in this format using the actual BG value
AM PS =BG before morning shot, give dose of insulin. Then give subsequent BG in format +x BG where x is the time in hours after shot
PM PS = BG before even shot

A BG of 96 on a human meter after 3 1/2 hours is cutting close since lowest on Vetsulin is 4-6 hours
Click to expand...
I don't understand how this is cutting it close as her true glucose value was 180. I realize that if her glucose on the alpha trak was 96 that would be dangerous. I am just trying to understand , I am not being confrontational, so please don't think that. I am a type 1 diabetic and have been since I was a kid so I understand this disease and numbers are the key to good control along with exercise, and insulin.
 
Ok, her spread sheet is now up to date. Could someone take a look at it and help me with getting her glucose in a normal range. Thank you so very much.
 
Betchadeb said:
I don't understand how this is cutting it close as her true glucose value was 180. I realize that if her glucose on the alpha trak was 96 that would be dangerous. I am just trying to understand , I am not being confrontational, so please don't think that. I am a type 1 diabetic and have been since I was a kid so I understand this disease and numbers are the key to good control along with exercise, and insulin.
Click to expand...

The way I understand it is that there's no direct conversion between the two types of meters. While at higher numbers you may be seeing differences of around 100, at lower numbers the difference is much smaller. You can't know the true value without testing it, but being as low as 96 means that a pet meter wouldn't have necessarily been 100 points higher. Also, there's a 20% variance allowed. So you could test the same drop of blood three times, get 80, 100, and 120, and they'd all be acceptable since they're within the 20% of 100. So that could explain why you had a human meter read 79 and a pet meter read 180, if the human was at the low end and the pet was at the high end. It can get really confusing trying to make comparisons between the two different types of meters because there are so many factors that affect the results.

Also, for dosing, vetsulin is one of the less commonly used insulins on here. You might have better luck posting on the vetsulin board, or maybe an older member can tag someone who can give you dosing advice. My instinct would be to try raising it by .25 of a unit and see how that works for a week, and go from there. But I would wait for confirmation before doing that, because I'm still fairly new to this and don't know too much about dosing. Sorry :oops:
 
Thanks for your help. I didn't know that there is a vetsulin board. I will definitely post on that board before doing anything.
 
Betchadeb said:
Thanks for your help. I didn't know that there is a vetsulin board. I will definitely post on that board before doing anything.
Click to expand...

Hi,

It's better that you stay in the Main Forum because there is really nobody on the Vetsulin board.
All of those who post in that forum are redirected here.

I'm sure that some people will soon answer to your queries.

I have also used this insulin, but it was really not a success. My cat metabolized it too quickly (thus, enormous drops were encountered), and I had to change finally to Lantus.

Regarding the meters : it's better that you stick with the values of your human meters, as here, the majority of people use them.
 
Last edited:
Considering she was just diagnosed this month, I'd say you are doing an awesome job at getting her regulated! A month into CC's treatment and we were still in the reds and high pinks for sure.

My only suggestion would be to get more mid cycle readings so that you have more information. I saw in your profile you are giving your cat goats milk? Milk has carbs, I would steer clear of that. I don't know anything about the straight answers food... what is the carb content of that?
 
try to get a +4 and a +6 if you can. 2.5 units when she is starting in the blue numbers may be a bit much... You may want to reduce to 1.5 or 2. You could be sending her too low. You don't want her to hypo. You don't have to shoot the exact same number every day.... You can base it on the preshot number. when it's lower like this it's really important to get mid cycle readings so she doesn't hypo.
 
Hi @Betchadeb -

Great job with the testing!

For the nadir numbers you have been getting I would take nadir into consideration as well as the preshot test. Vetsulin's action is typically quite harsh and with nadirs in double figures it is wise to dose conservatively for safety. (When Saoirse was on Vetsulin (aka Caninsulin) I wasn't comfortable safety-wise with her getting double-digit nadirs. Also the FDMB Vetsulin/Caninsulin Guide makes a general recommendation not to let a dose take the nadir BG under 100mg/dL as measured on a human meter.)

Some cats metabolise insulin faster than others. In your spreadsheet data I see that Skylar has been well under 100 mg/dL by +4 and +5 in some cycles. I would recommend that you get some +2 and +3 tests in because, due to the way that Vetsulin typically works, it can exert its most powerful BG-lowering effect fairly early in each cycle and Skylar's BG numbers could potentially be already heading back up by +5 (i.e. the nadir could be lower and earlier). The +2 test can give you insight into how fast the dose is dropping the BG and the +3 test can help you catch earlier nadirs. Both can give you a heads-up on cycles that have potential to take Skylar uncomfortably low. Which brings me to the next very important point ...

I also recommend strongly that you get a 'before bed' test every evening (c. +2 or, better, +3) to see how low BG is at that stage and whether Skylar might need additional monitoring before you sleep. A lot of cats can run a bit lower at night so as a general rule it is safest to regularly get mid-cycle tests on both AM and PM cycles. (If a cat does tend to run lower in one cycle than the other you need to ensure that the dose you're using is as safe as possible for BOTH cycles.)


Mogs
.
 
Last edited:
Those are really good numbers. I also think it would be a good idea to decrease the dose, especially the PM dose. It is best to change doses in small increments. I also feel uncomfortable with double didget numbers. I am slowly lowering Callie's doses (she gets more in the morning ) because her numbers keep going too low.

With Vetsulin, you have to look forward. Where are her numbers going, not what they are now. I like Vetsulin because it is more flexible then some of the other insulins. Sometimes I can't get home on time. I have been as been as much as an hour late with the shot without any problems.

You are doing really good for someone so new to the sugardance.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top