Newbie questions

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Bash’s Mom

Bash’s Mom

Member Since 2019
Bash was just diagnosed yesterday. I see the vet tomorrow to find out what insulin we are putting Bash on and how to do the doses and at home tests. I have a list of questions I want to ask her, but I was also curious about all of your opinions. Feel free to answer some or all :) thank you! - Bash’s nervous Mom.

  • I’m assuming it’s better to miss a dose than double up, correct?
  • What is the acceptable range for the scheduled times? Give or take an hour? Two hours?
  • Let’s say I forget and remember 4 hours after his dose - at what point should I just count it as a missed dose and skip it?
  • At what level should I NOT give an injection? (I know this will likely be specific to him, but just curious)
  • When should I test - before or after he eats?
  • He’s a slow eater - he likes to nibble, then come back. When should I give him the dose?
  • What is a good range to shoot for?
  • What if he is right on the border of a boundary? Like if I shouldn’t give a dose of he’s under 200 and it’s 210, what should I do?
  • Is it better to err on the early or late side?
  • What if I can’t get a reading and I can’t wait any longer to keep trying? Should I give the dose or skip it?
  • He likes multiple small meals rather than a few large ones, what are strategies for doing this with wet food? (Right now he has dry food out all day, then gets wet food at night)
 
Bash’s Mom said:
I’m assuming it’s better to miss a dose than double up, correct?
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Yes....NEVER re-shoot no matter how sure you are that you gave a furshot

Bash’s Mom said:
What is the acceptable range for the scheduled times? Give or take an hour? Two hours?
Click to expand...

Depends on the type of insulin. Some have a little more wiggle room than others.

Bash’s Mom said:
Let’s say I forget and remember 4 hours after his dose - at what point should I just count it as a missed dose and skip it?
Click to expand...

The majority of the time, you'd just call it a furshot and wait until the next shot time. If you do shoot late, you'll have to work your way back to your chosen shot time by adjusting 15 minutes per cycle or 30 minutes per day.

Bash’s Mom said:
At what level should I NOT give an injection? (I know this will likely be specific to him, but just curious)
Click to expand...

At first, if you get a Pre-shot under 200, you should stall, DON'T feed and post for help. Test again in 20-30 minutes to see if the number goes up without the influence of food. As you gather more data and experience that number will come down.

Bash’s Mom said:
When should I test - before or after he eats?
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Depends on which insulin to a point....if it's one of the better ones like Lantus, ProZinc, Levemir, you Test/Feed/Shoot....all within about 5-10 minutes. Test to make sure they're high enough for insulin, Feed to make sure they're at least willing to eat and Shoot.

On harsher insulins like Vetsulin, you want to Test, Feed, wait 20-30 minutes and shoot so that there's food on board when the insulin kicks in.

Bash’s Mom said:
He’s a slow eater - he likes to nibble, then come back. When should I give him the dose?
Click to expand...

If he's on one of the better insulins, it's fine for him to graze. The gentle insulins usually take a few hours to start to "kick in", so he has 2-3 hours to finish his meal.

I think most of your other questions are already answered in the other questions I've answered.....a lot of it depends on the type of insulin you're using which is a good reason to get your signature set up as soon as possible. If you look below our comments, you'll see that we all have some basic information about our cats. By having that filled out, we don't have to keep asking the same questions over and over again. The info we like to see is:

Your name/Cat's name, age, sex, date of diagnosis, type of insulin, type of meter, type of food, any other health issues or meds? and a general location.

The link to your spreadsheet also goes in the signature (like you have it already)
 
Thank you thank you thank you!!! Those are great answers. I really appreciate you taking the time to answer, Chris & China. That’s great info.

In reading through, that also made me wonder, is there a glossary somewhere for commonly used terms? For example ”furshot” was a new one.

I’ll get my signature updated tomorrow once I’m not on mobile :) thank you again!
 
A furshot is when you're not sure how much (if any) insulin actually got into the cat. Sometimes you'll feel a wet spot but you still never re-shoot since you have no way of knowing how much insulin actually got into the cat.

If you use Lantus, it also has a very distinct smell. You'll never forget it! The closest thing I can think of is that it smells like the adhesive they use on Bandaids. (or the whole Bandaid factory!)

Here's a list of common slang terms and abbreviations we use here.

And here
 
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