Jill & Alex said:
hi anne. hope you're feeling well and recovering quickly.
Hi Jill, thanks for the reply and the good wishes. I am still pretty low energy and not able to eat much but I am healing, just not as fast as I would like of course! The recovery time means I have about 4 more weeks before I return to work and no other traveling, so I will be here and able to monitor most of that time, which is good news!
Jill & Alex said:
in order to collect the data you'll need to shoot on a dropping number and go to work with any peace of mind you'll have to do it while you're home... while you're available to monitor. you'll want to get a good feel for zener's onset, nadir, and how much duration he's getting. you'll also want to know how food affects his numbers at different points in the cycle. you'll want to see if he self-feeds when he's dropping. you'll want to know how foods with varying % of carbs affect him at different points in the cycle. you might want to train him to use a timed feeder. caregivers feel a whole lot better leaving the house knowing there was food available at key times in their kitty's cycle.
I know that MC food will help his surf and HC food will bring him up. LC doesn't do too much for increasing his numbers if he is dropping. But I still don't have a good feel for his onset, nadir and duration. His appetite is still very diminished and we have to use fortiflora or cypro to get him to eat, so I am not yet sure if he will self feed if his numbers are low. His appetite is still quite a struggle.
Jill & Alex said:
once you have more data, you'll begin to pick out patterns. you'll begin to recognize when a bounce is clearing and he's sliding into a low preshot number by the action over the preceding days. initially, a bounce can last as long as 72 hours.
He appears to have some sort of wave where he has a few good cycles, then drops. Of course, we got him off track with having to decrease the dose when I had unexpected surgery. I have seen him take as long as 72 hours to clear a bounce, but don't yet feel very confident in what I see in the numbers. I'll have Liz take a look at your message, she is the math whiz of the family and is the one who is studying spreadsheets since she has a mind for numbers and numbers make me queasy!
Jill & Alex said:
those +10s and +11s will give you an idea of the rate of the drop or rise.
He is quite often still going down at the +10s and +11s, so I am wondering if he may be a late nadir kitty. Today, though he was pretty steady at +10 on the 1.75u dose.
Jill & Alex said:
sometimes kitties have dropping numbers which are simply the cat's nadir. we call them late nadir kitties. my alex is one of them. the data i've collected allows me to shoot her in the 50s without any second thoughts, feed her at ps time, +1, and +6.
Zener was a free feeder until he developed diabetes and a kibble eater too, so we have made many changes. He also has lost some weight and we've just been trying to get him to eat whenever possible to prevent further loss, maybe that's not the right idea. I'm not yet sure what are the best times for him to eat other than early in the cycle when he is getting the insulin on board.
Jill & Alex said:
sometimes kitties will dip at the end of a cycle after already having had a discernible nadir. in that case, you'd want to shoot on schedule because the numbers are going nowhere but up.
I don't think we have seen that with him yet.
Jill & Alex said:
these are the kinds of things you'll want to learn about zener in the next few weeks.
We have been trying to get data at different times as the constant testing was starting to stress him (and us) a little. So, we were trying to test AMPS, +2, then +6, +9, +10 or +11 in the day and PMPS, +2, +3 at night (unless he was really dropping and then I would stay up or get up and check, not able to do that right now while I am recovering).
Jill & Alex said:
several caregivers have moved up their shot times so they're able to get a +1 and/or +2 before heading out the door in the morning. oftentimes, those spot checks will give you an idea of where the cycle is going before you leave the house. that info enables you to feed some higher carb food (or leave it in a feeder) if necessary. moving up your shot time will also give you a little wiggle room time-wise if you do have to stall a shot.
We have finally been able to do that. He is now at 6:30 am which will give time for a +1, +2 and on some days a +3 before I leave for work. By having the 6:30 pm time, I can get several spot checks before bedtime. This is a much better time than what we were on.
Jill & Alex said:
Immensely, thanks so much for the help!
:YMHUG:
