? Need advice on increasing dose

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Summers Mom

Summers Mom

Member Since 2017
I was wanting to know if i should increase summer this morning or hold another day or so. She is already on 5 units of lantus 2 x daily. I wish she would go ahead and somewhat level off so i would not have to keep increasing her. It worries me she is getting so much insulin. What are you guys opinion on this? Thanks for being here. I don't know what i would do without you all!
 
Summers Mom said:
I was wanting to know if i should increase summer this morning or hold another day or so. She is already on 5 units of lantus 2 x daily. I wish she would go ahead and somewhat level off so i would not have to keep increasing her. It worries me she is getting so much insulin. What are you guys opinion on this? Thanks for being here. I don't know what i would do without you all!
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I like all that blue on her SS. On TR you could increase to 5.25 u. Let's see what the pros say. As far as how much insulin, a kitty needs what a kitty needs. Some here have gone down a lot in dose requirement once a certain level was reached that got a good response. You might be getting close based on the better numbers lately.
 
I think it was a good call, Debra, good luck with the dosecrease!

You are approaching a good dose, I love how the sea of yellow is being replaced by blue. I think the only thing more insulin is going to hurt (when it's called for) is your wallet! ;) Summer needs what she needs, as Kris said. And hopefully after some time on a good dose, you'll be doing decreases instead of increases. :bighug:
 
Those blues are looking good, but the goal is green, so and increase was fine. Sometimes if I was getting low blues, I might hold another couple cycles. As per TR, hold 6-10 cycles for blue and I would usually hold for 8 for low blue.

I am sorry I wasn't on earlier and you didn't get advice appropriate to a kitty of Summer's dose size. When kitties get over 5 units, unless they are seeing green, it's best to increase by 0.5 units at a time. Think of the increase in terms of a percentage. The 0.5 increase is just a 10% increase. On lower doses, say 2 unit, a 0.25 increase is more than 10%.

And don't worry about the amount of insulin she needs - she needs whatever she needs. ECID is so true. The important numbers are the blood sugar numbers, and Summer is spending a lot of time under renal threshold, so that's a good thing.
 
For what it's worth, I think once you start getting closer to the sweet spot it should be ok trying 0.25 increments or 0.5 on how comfortable you are and how often you can test.
ECID, I have seen a big difference in numbers when increasing from skinny to an even dose with Chuck. He's on a higher dose (16.75 units right now).
As long as you can monitor and are comfy with it let the surf (paws crossed) begin! Good luck!
 
Kris & Teasel said:
I like all that blue on her SS. On TR you could increase to 5.25 u. Let's see what the pros say. As far as how much insulin, a kitty needs what a kitty needs. Some here have gone down a lot in dose requirement once a certain level was reached that got a good response. You might be getting close based on the better numbers lately.
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Thank you so much!
 
Stacy & Asia said:
I think it was a good call, Debra, good luck with the dosecrease!

You are approaching a good dose, I love how the sea of yellow is being replaced by blue. I think the only thing more insulin is going to hurt (when it's called for) is your wallet! ;) Summer needs what she needs, as Kris said. And hopefully after some time on a good dose, you'll be doing decreases instead of increases. :bighug:
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Thank you and i pray summer will soon hit greens! :D
 
Wendy&Neko said:
Those blues are looking good, but the goal is green, so and increase was fine. Sometimes if I was getting low blues, I might hold another couple cycles. As per TR, hold 6-10 cycles for blue and I would usually hold for 8 for low blue.

I am sorry I wasn't on earlier and you didn't get advice appropriate to a kitty of Summer's dose size. When kitties get over 5 units, unless they are seeing green, it's best to increase by 0.5 units at a time. Think of the increase in terms of a percentage. The 0.5 increase is just a 10% increase. On lower doses, say 2 unit, a 0.25 increase is more than 10%.

And don't worry about the amount of insulin she needs - she needs whatever she needs. ECID is so true. The important numbers are the blood sugar numbers, and Summer is spending a lot of time under renal threshold, so that's a good thing
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Thank you so much for your reply. I figured increasing summer this morning by .25 was needed and no need to apologize for not seeing my post earlier. I know everyone is busy especially right now at Christmas. So is that what everyone does when their cat hits 5 units or more is increase by .5 instead of .25? I may try .5 next time i increase if i don't chicken out! Lol What are the blood sugar numbers when they can do damage to their organs? I know you said summer's numbers were under the renal threshold so i was just wondering. Thank you again. It means alot not to be alone in this journey with summer. :cat:
 
StephG said:
For what it's worth, I think once you start getting closer to the sweet spot it should be ok trying 0.25 increments or 0.5 on how comfortable you are and how often you can test.
ECID, I have seen a big difference in numbers when increasing from skinny to an even dose with Chuck. He's on a higher dose (16.75 units right now).
As long as you can monitor and are comfy with it let the surf (paws crossed) begin! Good luck!
Click to expand...

Thank you so much! :)
 
Bobbie And Bubba said:
Hey there! Bubba got up to 5.25 dose before he starting to click and start to race down the dosing ladder. The extra .25 dose over the 5 units is what did it for him but, ECID. Good luck with the next dose crease.
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Thank you and i sure hope summer will click soon and hit those greens! :D
 
Summers Mom said:
So is that what everyone does when their cat hits 5 units or more is increase by .5 instead of .25?
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That's what we suggest....think about it....when we first start out at 1U, we go up by .25......that's a 25% increase.

When you get to 5U, a .5 increase is still only 10%, but of course we still want to go up at a safe rate and on those bigger doses, if the depot gets over-full, it can lead to some long nights of testing

Summers Mom said:
What are the blood sugar numbers when they can do damage to their organs?
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Depends on where you look, but generally, above 250......some cats can be over renal threshold at 150...some don't get there until over 300. The only way to know what Summer's renal threshold is would be to use urine test strips to test for glucose spilling over into his urine and comparing it to his blood glucose numbers.
 
Chris & China said:
That's what we suggest....think about it....when we first start out at 1U, we go up by .25......that's a 25% increase.

When you get to 5U, a .5 increase is still only 10%, but of course we still want to go up at a safe rate and on those bigger doses, if the depot gets over-full, it can lead to some long nights of testing

Depends on where you look, but generally, above 250......some cats can be over renal threshold at 150...some don't get there until over 300. The only way to know what Summer's renal threshold is would be to use urine test strips to test for glucose spilling over into his urine and comparing it to his blood glucose numbers.
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And to add to Chris’s post, that 250 is on an AT not a human meter.
 
Summers Mom said:
What are the blood sugar numbers when they can do damage to their organs?
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Renal threshold can vary by cat. Of course ECID. :p You can get ketodiastix that measure the presence of sugar in her urine. When a cat hits renal threshold, the sugar level is too high for the kidneys to handle so it's dumped into the urine. I never did the ketodiastix, but I would test Neko right before taking her in to the vet for urinalysis, so I had a pretty good idea hers was in the low 200's on a human meter.

To others on this thread, it is suspected that Summer has a high dose condition. We have discussed the possibility before that she might have Cushings. With high dose conditions comes insulin resistance and sometimes the need to be a bit more aggressive. The example of Bubba does not work here - he had been seeing lots of green at 5.0 units and just needed that little bit more.
Summers Mom said:
So is that what everyone does when their cat hits 5 units or more is increase by .5 instead of .25? I may try .5 next time i increase if i don't chicken out!
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Yes, we suggest a 0.5 unit increase if all you are seeing is blues. You can tweak or try a 0.25 unit increase if you are seeing the odd green.
 
I mean the occasional high green, maybe just once or twice in 6 cycles. Sometimes we'll use the smaller dose increases to add more green to the spreadsheet.
 
Wendy&Neko said:
The example of Bubba does not work here - he had been seeing lots of green at 5.0 units and just needed that little bit more.
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Yes, Bubba was having greens when I only increased by .25 and I should have acknowledged that point when I commented. My intention when I posted was more about encouragement to Summer's Mom when she wrote:
Summers Mom said:
. It worries me she is getting so much insulin
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ETA: I didn't realize there was a possibility of high dose condition or Cushing so that is a game changer for sure.
 
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