5/22 Suzie AMPS 138 +4 60, +6 45, 44

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Maria & Suzie

Maria & Suzie

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Hi all!

Suzie has been cruising so smoothly that yesterday I left her with DH to keep an eye on her so I could go into the office (for a change...). Check out those smoooooth numbers !

We also went to the vet for a check-up yesterday evening. It's quite a drive, we were all tired when we got home, but oh so worth it. Suzie got an A++ on her report card from the vet !

About a month ago, Suzie weighed a pathetic 3.2kg (about 7 lbs), now she is at.... wait for it.... 4kg (8.8 lbs) !!!!! When she weighed her, none of us could believe our eyes, even the vet almost did a dance with us!!

She said she could not believe it was the same cat, and is impressed with the dose reductions, and whatever it is that I'm doing, to keep it up basically. (thanks to the help of everyone here)

She was not overly concerned about Suzie's kidneys or days of no appetite, she says to give Suzie time to adjust to everything, weight gain, insuline, glucose numbers.

Hopefully she's not going to give me any wild numbers today!
 
Re: 5/22 Suzie AMPS 138

Those are lovely numbers, exactly what we want to see! Perfect example of "shoot low to stay low". Glad the vet was pleased with Suzie (and you, and our recommendations) :mrgreen: 4 Kg is a fantastic weight. It's also nice to see them come back to life and you realize they are feeling much better. Hope she delivers another puuurrrrfect day!
 
Re: 5/22 Suzie AMPS 138

Congrats on the great vet report. You're doing all the right things for a healthy cat. Its nice that your vet is so approving.
 
Re: 5/22 Suzie AMPS 138

And now a nice green 60 at +4 !

The vet even asked me about info online, I think Lantus is relatively new for animal use here, I think she is keen to learn more herself (she is a slightly older vet, so nice to see she is interested in keeping up with the latest) and also to know where to send other diabetic-cat owners for additional info.

She kept the spreadsheet I printed-out, I could see her being impressed with the lowering numbers and lowering dosage.

Her own cat, Spock, is diabetic and she'd had a bad experience with caninsulin with him and started him on Lantus, and that's how Suzie ended up on Lantus straight away. She didn't say anything, but when I (diplomatically) mentioned the soft food making a difference, you could see her looking over at her Spock and having a think (Spock could do with losing weight and he's on 7 IU....). I showed her a print-out of the list of food Monique sent me and said that it was nice to know I could find LC food in the shops, and, again, she didn't comment, but she wasn't against it, and she took it in. She asked if I had any useful links to share. As she is Dutch-speaking, I gave her a few good ones I found in the Netherlands. So we may be converting a vet (and helping the vet's cat too!).

She was open-minded enough though to take the attitude "it's clearly working for Suzie, so keep it up". She didn't want to do the bloodwork yet, wants Suzie's system to settle a bit further. I would have been happier to have it done now, but then, I have to say, this vet HAS put us on the right path and whilst maybe not super-experienced with Lantus, is very experienced in general and clearly has a good eye for things (rather than some vets that don't have the experience and go purely by numbes....), so I'll go with it for now.

She said that if Suzie's thyroid was completely out of whack, she would not have gained weight like she did now (true), and Suze is nicely hydrated, so that implies her kidneys are ok. I am still going to look into low phospor food though...

Now I know her weight is ok, I can start to find the right amounts to stick to and more regular feeding times...

When we left the vet said, "sometimes I can't help them (the animals in general) anymore and have to euthanize them, so it's really nice to see that we've saved one!"

So, Suzie is giving me a nice green right now, will check in a bit that she doesn't go under that 50 and keeps us busy. It's a warm, lazy day here, going out to work a bit in the garden now...

Maria & Suzie :mrgreen:
 
Re: 5/22 Suzie AMPS 138 +4 60

There are so many vets that are "old school" or who against home testing. In their defense, I can't imagine how difficult it must be to have to have a grasp of a wide range of illnesses in a variety of species of animals that vets see in their practices. It must be nearly impossible to stay current in so many areas. It is to your vet's credit that she is listening and is open to learning.
 
Re: 5/22 Suzie AMPS 138 +4 60, +6 45

+6 is 45.

Here we go.

Boy, she's earning these dose reductions faster than we can blink lately, isn't she?

She's licking away at some gravy. She seems totally unconcerned, as usual.
 
Re: 5/22 Suzie AMPS 138 +4 60, +6 45

Thanks, but what can we do about the increase in my blood pressure? :?

It's getting a little easier to deal with, but my heart-rate does go up a bit. Glad I'm home for it though.

She better not do this tomorrow night, I'm going out and "Grandpa" is going to watch her...
 
And now it was a 44. More licking...

These dose reductions so close to each other, her ears look like they have multiple-piercings. A friend of mine said "what's next? A tattoo of a mouse?"

I'm nervously nibbling a cookie myself, not that I am the one who needs the blood-sugar hike....
 
The reductions aren't that close. However, a typical reduction is 0.25u. It looks like the last reduction of 0.5u held, but the protocol advises reductions of 0.25u.

My guess is that you are seeing this drop in numbers as you and Suzie are eliminating the dry food. We see this a lot. Even with the supposedly LC dry, it still has an influence on BG. Once it's gone, numbers can improve dramatically.
 
Actually......I would have reduced by the .5U especially since Suzie is also in the process of a diet change and was getting some pretty low numbers. As well the protocol allows for reducing by 1/2 unit when the dose is higher.

If blood glucose is < 50 mg/dL (2.8 mmol/L) Reduce dose by 0.25-0.5 IU depending on if cat on
low (<3 IU/cat) or high dose (≥ 3 IU/cat) of insulin
Click to expand...

Suzie was on 3.5U so a reduction to 3U would be allowed. The next reductions however going under 3U and now that she is better regulated should made in .25U steps unless she really tanks (<30 early in a cycle).

Congratulations on another reduction! Once she gets down under 2U the reductions will probably come further apart, that's when the fine tuning comes in. Right now her pancreas is healing all the time she is spending in the low blues and greens. Once it starts doing a little more work on it's own and the insulin is just providing support we want to try and keep that support "just right" so the pancreas does not become overburdened right away. Once significant healing has occured it will be trying to work but it is still very fragile and things can easily thrown out of balence and you end up falling back. You have a while before you get there, and at this stage you are still providing the most of the insulin needs so the pancreas is just resting, under 2U is where the injected insulin alone is less than what the body would normally produce so the pancreas is managing the rest.

Anyway I don't know why I'm going on here, just that at these doses abouve 3U you can take bigger steps (after all it's still a percent of the whole)

At 4UU reducing by .5U is 1/8th (about 12.5%)
At 1U reducing by .5U is 1/2 (50%) but reducing by .25U is 1/4 (just 25%)

See where I'm going? Maybe not ohmygod_smile
 
The latest was 138 at +9.

I'm grateful for everyone's input. It actually helps me to visualize her little pancreas healing to make it worth it.

Last week I was getting hassle from my boss, today DH complained a little... the time it takes to get her into safe numbers and not being able to go anywhere in the meantime.... I know it went faster today, so shoot me, but I had to reach for a smidge of honey at the 44 at +6.5, I just didn't have the multiple hours to spend on it today, as much as I love her... Not that I am expecting it to "poof" go up in 10 minutes, but it's disappointing to be trying with gravy, MC, HC, and see it go down.... just a bit frustrating. I hope I can find something that works better for her than what I am trying now.

She's not eating so much today, nothing I am worried about, but noticeably less interest, but then, it's suddenly a warm day here....

The other night I went down to 3.0 after much thought. I really appreciate everyone's input, I could not have done it without you all, but I finally went for 3.0 because she had only eaten 1/4 that day of what she normally eats, and if she'd done that during the night too, and the next day... not good... plus, I just HAD to go to the office, so played it super-safe. I can only attempt BOS when I have the time to follow it up...

Tomorrow night I have to be away and won't be around for her shot, I'll have to see how her numbers are doing tomorrow during the day, my Dad is going to watch her, I'll either have to prepare a low, safe dose for him to give (he can't cope with testing, not enough yet to be reliable anyway) or she'll have to skip a shot and she gets a needle-free evening... I thought of moving the shot, but it would be about a 5-hour move in either direction, and would just not work with our work schedules to re-adjust.

Thanks all!

Maria & Suzie
 
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