Ready to get Lucy better!

[hellolucy]

Hello! I'd like to introduce my kitty cat Lucy As you can see from the uploaded picture at the vet, she is quite the curious troublemaker!
Lucy is ~10 - 12 years old (pound kitty so unsure of her actual age). She was diagnosed with diabetes about 3 years ago and was able to get well regulated. Due to my own blind acceptance of what my vet told me (no more!), she was taken off of her insulin as a "cured" cat and eventually came down with a severe case of pancreatitis. That was approximately 6 months ago. I had her hospitalized for 3 full days and was in and out of the vet with her at all hours of the night in to mornings for a week prior to that. She recovered and is now back on insulin. She also lost her lifelong kitty brother to advanced CHF at the same time so am having a difficult time distinguishing her changes in behavior between that event or her just not feeling well due to the diabetes. I've tried the vet's recommendations (not the same vet as prior) in addition with trying to educate myself but am becoming overwhelmed. I just want her to get better and am very determined which is why I'm here. Looking forward to chatting with everyone!

My primary goals:
- Find a reliable at home testing meter to use. Currently using Alpha Trak 2 and it seems like a LOT of blood is needed (more than what the company actually says) in order to get a reading on the meter. Lucy already HATES this testing so having to re-poke her is not ideal.
- Test for ketones, purchased Ketostix with Amazon Prime last night (maybe you can tell I've already been reading some of the posts here... )
- Figure out if (and how) I need to lower her insulin dose and restart the at-home testing to determine if I've passed her "ideal" dose as the vet has just been recommending I increase by 1 unit every few weeks when I've called him with her high glucose numbers. Currently at 4 units of ProZinc with a U40 1mL (28G x 1/2") syringe. She was started out at 1 unit.
- Once I have a reliable testing meter in hand, figure out a good testing schedule and post it here using the test spreadsheet.

 

[Tracey&Jones (GA)]

Hi Lucy's Mom!

I am too new to give any dosing advice but can bump up your post.

I hope Lucy is feeling better! I am sorry on your lose of her brother. You never know with animals and cats can be so in turn with our stress.

Yah! For home testing! I am assuming you are an old pro since you have been on the FD ride before. You will find that we are very data driven here and for good reason. It helps to know the patterns! The more experienced members will use that data to help guide you on dose changes etc. Once you are set up on rolling, please post to the ProZinc forum to get those experienced eyes on Lucy's progress.

For meters I believe most users on the board use the ReliOn meter from Walmart. The strips are cheaper and the blood required is like 0.3 microliter. A small amount. It is a human meter but the experienced board members and the protocols used take that into account. I use a human meter as well.

For keytones - yeah! I bought the strips and used 2. Peace of mind is priceless though.

If I listened to my vet, Jones would still be on 2.5 units twice a day not the 0.1u less 4 drops (so like hardly anything) he is on now. Diet was a big factor (Low Carb) and dropping his steroid dosage was another. IBD provides for more challenge but Jones was great through it all.

I wish you good health to Lucy and a speedy remission.

 

[JanetNJ]

I have an alphatrak and it seriously takes a REALLY tiny dot to read. You are sure you are getting the blood to touch the black spot on the test strip, right? Maybe the dot of blood is getting absorbed onto her ear hair? If that's the case you can either put a little bit of neosporin/or vaseline on the ear prior so that it will be a barrier, or flick the tiny droplet onto the back of your fingernail and test it from there. Alphatrak requires the smallest amount of blood of any meter on the market (Relion micro requires the same .3)

 

[hellolucy]

I have an alphatrak and it seriously takes a REALLY tiny dot to read. You are sure you are getting the blood to touch the black spot on the test strip, right? Maybe the dot of blood is getting absorbed onto her ear hair? If that's the case you can either put a little bit of neosporin/or vaseline on the ear prior so that it will be a barrier, or flick the tiny droplet onto the back of your fingernail and test it from there. Alphatrak requires the smallest amount of blood of any meter on the market (Relion micro requires the same .3)

I need to try the Vaseline trick as I haven't before. The fingernail one sounds much easier too! I have tiny splatters of blood on the wall from her wiggling away and shaking her ear all over the place and I'm either of these would help! I decided I'm going to use the AT2 versus ReliOn for the next few weeks as these are the curve numbers I've been providing the vet (this hadn't even crossed my mind until reading some of the posts here so the board has already been super helpful!) and I want to keep them consistent (for now) since Lucy is not even close to being regulated just to more easily track progress.
On a semi-related note - do you happen to know if AT2 only requires the blood to be touching one of the two black markers on the strip versus both to provide a reading?

 

[JanetNJ]

I need to try the Vaseline trick as I haven't before. The fingernail one sounds much easier too! I have tiny splatters of blood on the wall from her wiggling away and shaking her ear all over the place and I'm either of these would help! I decided I'm going to use the AT2 versus ReliOn for the next few weeks as these are the curve numbers I've been providing the vet (this hadn't even crossed my mind until reading some of the posts here so the board has already been super helpful!) and I want to keep them consistent (for now) since Lucy is not even close to being regulated just to more easily track progress.
On a semi-related note - do you happen to know if AT2 only requires the blood to be touching one of the two black markers on the strip versus both to provide a reading?

Only one! Having the black spot on both sides is so you can use either hand. If you have too small of a sample it gives you like 30 seconds to add more blood, but you use the same side you tried first.

 

[hellolucy]

Only one! Having the black spot on both sides is so you can use either hand. If you have too small of a sample it gives you like 30 seconds to add more blood, but you use the same side you tried first.

Okay, that makes a big difference (for me)! I was trying to completely saturate both sides and getting super frustrated. So essentially, I just need to "dip" one side? A lot of times I'll receive an Error message but have never been able to figure out what I'm doing that is causing it.

 

[JanetNJ]

Okay, that makes a big difference (for me)! I was trying to completely saturate both sides and getting super frustrated. So essentially, I just need to "dip" one side? A lot of times I'll receive an Error message but have never been able to figure out what I'm doing that is causing it.

Yes... There's a tiny bit that protrudes out of the edge black spot.. Touch that tiny point on the drop of blood and it will wisk it in. And as I said if that cat is not wanting to sit still just move it into the back of your nail and test from there.