? 1/30 Kai AMPS 117, +2 78, +4 50, +6 54, PMPS 450

Maddie & Kai

Maddie & Kai

Active Member
Yesterday's Thread

Kai had a much better cycle last night. I hope today is just as promising.

Tomorrow we have our first ever Internal Medicine appointment. Kai has to fast and is not allowed to have any food after 10pm tonight. Tomorrow morning may kill me inside because I know how hungry he will be in the morning. He is going to be so confused and wondering why he isn't getting food after his first morning test:( I am also only allowed to give him half his insulin dose tomorrow morning. Giving insulin without food makes me super anxious and nervous. If he is in the green I think I may only give 0.5 units instead of half (1.25 units). How does everyone else handle fasting their diabetic kitties? I'd love to hear any tips or thoughts.


Sending everyone positive energy and good vibes today! ❤️:bighug:❤️
 
Maddie & Kai said:
Yesterday's Thread

Kai had a much better cycle last night. I hope today is just as promising.

Tomorrow we have our first ever Internal Medicine appointment. Kai has to fast and is not allowed to have any food after 10pm tonight. Tomorrow morning may kill me inside because I know how hungry he will be in the morning. He is going to be so confused and wondering why he isn't getting food after his first morning test:( I am also only allowed to give him half his insulin dose tomorrow morning. Giving insulin without food makes me super anxious and nervous. If he is in the green I think I may only give 0.5 units instead of half (1.25 units). How does everyone else handle fasting their diabetic kitties? I'd love to hear any tips or thoughts.


Sending everyone positive energy and good vibes today! ❤️:bighug:❤️
Click to expand...
hi Maddie, I know there are protocols here for fasting for dental procedures where a cat will be having anesthesia, etc.

Why does Kai have to Fast?
Are they doing some kind of testing that requires that? And no food from10 o’clock is a very long time for a fast.
Did you ask the vets office what their protocol is for a diabetic cat who needs food with insulin?
If not, I would have a conversation with them. What time is the appointment tomorrow? Is it in the morning, is it first thing, how long after your injection is the appointment?

Personally, I have found with Ivy, fasting and giving insulin are not a good combination for her.

Since I take her frequently for lab work, I fast her for that lab work. What I do is give her a half a dose the night before and I skip her insulin in the morning of the appointment.
The reason that I do that is because she has been known to dive overnight and if she were to do so, and I couldn’t give any carbs or food because she was fasting, that would be a problem.

That’s why I give the half a dose the night before to make her less likely to take a dive. And the reason I skip the morning of the appointment, which is usually at +4, because I have been at the vet’s office and she was very low and it was very chaotic and nerve-racking. I took food with me and had the lab tech feed her in the back since she was going pretty low for her.

At that point, I decided I’m not doing that again. I had given a half a dose the morning of the appointment that day and vowed not to do that again and it has worked out better for me and Ivy when I just skip the dose that morning.
I just pretended it was a fur shot And then I feed her as soon as I get home.
I also don’t give her food past midnight, water is allowed. But I also give her a few teaspoons of food the night before the appointment overnight around +8, which is eight hours before the lab appointment, if that makes sense.

Yes, it does affect her Depot and BG for a few cycles until the Depot reestablishes, but she’s never had DKA and doesn’t have a Ketone issue.
(If Kai has those issues then it’s another story.)

I’m not advising you what to do here. I’m just giving you our story so you have a reference.

Wishing you lots of good luck tomorrow with your appointment :bighug::cat::bighug:
 
Staci & Ivy said:
hi Maddie, I know there are protocols here for fasting for dental procedures where a cat will be having anesthesia, etc.

Why does Kai have to Fast?
Are they doing some kind of testing that requires that? And no food from10 o’clock is a very long time for a fast.
Did you ask the vets office what their protocol is for a diabetic cat who needs food with insulin?
If not, I would have a conversation with them. What time is the appointment tomorrow? Is it in the morning, is it first thing, how long after your injection is the appointment?

Personally, I have found with Ivy, fasting and giving insulin are not a good combination for her.

Since I take her frequently for lab work, I fast her for that lab work. What I do is give her a half a dose the night before and I skip her insulin in the morning of the appointment.
The reason that I do that is because she has been known to dive overnight and if she were to do so, and I couldn’t give any carbs or food because she was fasting, that would be a problem.

That’s why I give the half a dose the night before to make her less likely to take a dive. And the reason I skip the morning of the appointment, which is usually at +4, because I have been at the vet’s office and she was very low and it was very chaotic and nerve-racking. I took food with me and had the lab tech feed her in the back since she was going pretty low for her.

At that point, I decided I’m not doing that again. I had given a half a dose the morning of the appointment that day and vowed not to do that again and it has worked out better for me and Ivy when I just skip the dose that morning.
I just pretended it was a fur shot And then I feed her as soon as I get home.
I also don’t give her food past midnight, water is allowed. But I also give her a few teaspoons of food the night before the appointment overnight around +8, which is eight hours before the lab appointment, if that makes sense.

Yes, it does affect her Depot and BG for a few cycles until the Depot reestablishes, but she’s never had DKA and doesn’t have a Ketone issue.
(If Kai has those issues then it’s another story.)

I’m not advising you what to do here. I’m just giving you our story so you have a reference.

Wishing you lots of good luck tomorrow with your appointment :bighug::cat::bighug:
Click to expand...

Hey Staci,
I was hoping I would hear from you, since I know you take Miss Ivy for regular lab work, so thank you!

They will do some lab work on Kai and that is why they want him to fast. The appointment is a 10am. Here is their protocol for diabetic kitties:
"Please have them fast for the consultation by withholding food and treats after 10pm the night before the appointment. They can have access to water. Since they are diabetic, we would like you to feed and administer insulin as normal the night before the appointment. The morning of the appointment, please withhold breakfast and give ½ of the normal dose of insulin. You do not need to restrict their access to water."

I think i may just skip his insulin that morning. And I think I will call them today and ask a few more questions too.
 
Good luck tomorrow!! I don’t have experience with that but I would feel the same way you do, skeptical to give a dose on no food…
 
Maddie & Kai said:
Hey Staci,
I was hoping I would hear from you, since I know you take Miss Ivy for regular lab work, so thank you!

They will do some lab work on Kai and that is why they want him to fast. The appointment is a 10am. Here is their protocol for diabetic kitties:
"Please have them fast for the consultation by withholding food and treats after 10pm the night before the appointment. They can have access to water. Since they are diabetic, we would like you to feed and administer insulin as normal the night before the appointment. The morning of the appointment, please withhold breakfast and give ½ of the normal dose of insulin. You do not need to restrict their access to water."

I think i may just skip his insulin that morning. And I think I will call them today and ask a few more questions too.
Click to expand...
I’m glad I could help. It’s only one cycle and he’s doing so well, he will recover quickly.

I would also think midnight would be a perfectly fine cut off instead of 10 o’clock, but that’s just my opinion.

The only reason I give half a dose the night before is if she were to dive, and I were fasting her I wouldn’t be able to give food so that was why I wanted her Depot to be a little less strong than normal. Again, Just my thoughts this is what seems to work better for me and Ivy.
:bighug::bighug::bighug:
 
Not just your opinion Staci! The 10PM cutoff is ridiculous! Sounds like they are thinking a possible ultrasound? I'm taking a non diabetic cat in for ultrasound tomorrow and she gets to eat until midnight and her appointment is at 9. Labs don't need 12 hour fasting. I never fasted Neko before going to IM appointments where we had both ultrasounds and blood work done. When she needed fasting for blood work which some blood tests do need, I scheduled the blood draw for just before PMPS and just didn't feed the back half of the cycle. The IM might be willing to schedule a tech appointment for the blood draw for another time that works better.

Do you know why the IM vet and what the area of concern might be?
 
One more thing, the only reason I fast Ivy for her labs is because her blood tends to be very lipemic. Years ago I never fasted her for labs, but this is a more recent thing for us, and of course now that she’s diabetic it’s more complicated with the insulin and skipping, etc.
So unless there’s some really good reason, I wonder why they’re having you fast Kai in the first place.
 
Wendy&Neko said:
Not just your opinion Staci! The 10PM cutoff is ridiculous! Sounds like they are thinking a possible ultrasound? I'm taking a non diabetic cat in for ultrasound tomorrow and she gets to eat until midnight and her appointment is at 9. Labs don't need 12 hour fasting. I never fasted Neko before going to IM appointments where we had both ultrasounds and blood work done. When she needed fasting for blood work which some blood tests do need, I scheduled the blood draw for just before PMPS and just didn't feed the back half of the cycle. The IM might be willing to schedule a tech appointment for the blood draw for another time that works better.

Do you know why the IM vet and what the area of concern might be?
Click to expand...
Staci & Ivy said:
One more thing, the only reason I fast Ivy for her labs is because her blood tends to be very lipemic. Years ago I never fasted her for labs, but this is a more recent thing for us, and of course now that she’s diabetic it’s more complicated with the insulin and skipping, etc.
So unless there’s some really good reason, I wonder why they’re having you fast Kai in the first place.
Click to expand...

Tomorrow's appointment was scheduled back in July, back when Kai was really bouncing around and had both me and our Vet scratching our heads. This was a few months after we had switched from Prozinc to Lantus. Previously we had switched from vetsulin to Prozinc. So it felt like we were running out of options. Our vet sent a referral to this IM place which only takes referrals. The goal was to figure out why he is bouncing around so much. The IM clinic was so booked out they had to schedule us really far out because he wasn't an emergency case. Originally, it was scheduled for December but I had a water pipe bust in the house 2 days before his appointment and everything was a mess so i ended up getting it reschedule for January. So basically this is a consultation but anything can happen tomorrow from lab work to an ultrasound. I would like for them to at least rule out acute pancreatitis or anything like that. So an ultrasound is probably why they want him to fast. But i agree 12 hours is too long. I am still going to feed him his second snack tonight at 10pm. I am also going to give him his full dose tonight because he bounced back up to 450 at his PMPS. :rolleyes: But I told them I was going to skip his insulin completely tomorrow morning and not do a half dose....maybe. I'm going to test him and see where he sits tomorrow morning. If he is really high in the morning i may give him a token dose of 0.5 units. His nadir is usually +4 which is 10am which is also his appointment time, so if something happens we will already be at the vet. Then they can take care of him while I bite their heads off :mad: hopefully it wont come to that.

Overall, i'm hoping they can tell me why he bounces so much. Or at-least rule some things out.
 
Kai is bouncing because prior to very recently, he hasn't much time in green. And that was because his dose was too low. As you have increased the dose he is now spending more time in green, which is great! Continue on as you have been lately, and the bouncing will diminish.

I hope this IM vet has a specialty in endocrinology and can help.
 
Hi Maddie. I don't have much experience with fasting, but I do understand your concerns.
Wishing you good luck tomorrow. Have a relaxed evening and a safe surf, Kai!
:bighug::cat::bighug:
 
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