7/20 Harley: 393 PMPS, 229 +4...236 AMPS

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KKL

KKL

Member Since 2013
Hello,
I am new to the TR, but I have a lengthy thread with some help from forumites :) We have what appears to be a microdose kitty. I have been working on perfecting "one drop" which I am guessing is about 0.15 unit when I put colored water on a mirror. Have had some challenges with mismarked syringes (now I keep one filled to compare to each time I dose), errors with bouncing and snapping insulin out of the needle when I pull off the cap (with such a small dose it makes a difference).

There were a few days last week that he was low enough in the morning that I was hesitant to give him his drop because I was due to be on the road for 8-10 hours. I work from home as an appraiser, but if I am busy I am on the road a lot too. Trying to find balance and keep him safe. there are times I have had to give him a crunchy treat if I had to sleep or go to work and couldn't keep an eye on him. (For the most part I get up several times a night to test him if he runs low, like last night)

His numbers are all over the place with just a tiny dose (most 1 drop indicates pushing the plunger down with a little twist, just under the "0" line which yields one drop). I gave him a slightly fatter drop yesterday evening and he got in the greens but then I couldn't shoot morning shot. He was fine until about +20 and he spiked back up.

To answer he gets Wellness Turkey wet food. Due to health issues in the household and Harley's background health issues, we have them all on the same wet food.

Any thoughts on his bouncing appreciated.
 
Re: 7/17 Harley "NEW": 95 AMPS/441 PMPS

Hey there and welcome to Lantus Land!


Harley is a microdose cat and so likely there are issues getting a consistent dose at such small numbers due to the inaccuracies of syringes. Also the work schedule has made it hard to get enough data to shoot low, but I think she really needs to learn.. FYI here is the post from health http://www.felinediabetes.com/FDMB/viewtopic.php?f=28&t=98818

Kris - we post on here every day - or as often as schedule allows. You want to add a ? icon to your post when you have a question. Plus a link to your previous day post so people can look back.

Wendy
 
Re: 7/17 Harley "NEW": 95 AMPS/441 PMPS

Perfect Wendy, thank you!!
Yes, the 11th, 12th and 13th I was gone for most of the afternoon :(

Hopefully we can get some insight into the overall picture....
 
Re: 7/17 Harley "NEW": 95 AMPS/441 PMPS

Welcome to LL I'm Linda and my big boy Lucky, I had a Harley I do miss him. Hope you gets this all dialed in, good luck :smile:
 
Re: 7/17 Harley "NEW": 95 AMPS/441 PMPS

Welcome to LantusLand, Kris and Harley.

I will have to go back and read all your previous posts.... so I will do that tomorrow. ( I have a day off , Yay!)
I think what strikes me when I look at your ss.... is back on 6/21 , you shot 1 unit and got that low.... and then your dosing started varying a bunch.
So I think I need to look at your history.... and go tag someone to come help.

I think it might help to rewrite your 1 drop as 0.1 u on your sheet.... maybe it's just affecting me when I look at the sheet.

I'm glad you've shown up here....
I think you'll get a lot more help here to get Harley in the nice lower numbers he seems to be capable of putting out.
 
Re: 7/17 Harley "NEW": 95 AMPS/441 PMPS

Hi Kris

Rhiannon asked me to have a look. I need a bit to read the posts from Heslth and look at his SS. Be back shortly.

Welcome to Lantus Land.
 
Re: 7/17 Harley "NEW": 95 AMPS/441 PMPS

IMHO, I think the 1 drop which is .1/.15u would work nicely for him if you could shoot consistently. I would try and be as consistent as possible when you draw the dose.

I'd like to get some other eyes on his SS to brainstorm what to do with your work situation and shooting. It will probably be tomorrow before we get back to you.
 
Re: 7/17 Harley "NEW": 95 AMPS/441 PMPS

WOW!!
Thank you all so much!!! Wendy has been a great help the last few weeks, I have learned a lot!! Harley has been a tricky boy to dose. I look forward to hearing some ideas :)
 
Re: 7/17 Harley "NEW": 95 AMPS/441 PMPS

Hi guys .. just wanted to drop in and say welcome to lantus land! Looks like you've got some good advice going on here .. I look forward to reading all about harleys success!
 
Re: 7/17 Harley "NEW": 95 AMPS/441 PMPS

Hi Kris!

I know that Wendy has been helping you over in Health quite a bit, working on that microdosing.

Harley definitely needs some insulin and he needs it twice a day. Once a day simply is not enough to keep him in those nice green and blue numbers to give his pancreas time to heal.

I think one of the best things you can do, is post here every day.

We may need you to start shooting some of those really low numbers. That would only be if you are going to be home for the day to monitor, have HC (high carb) food, and plenty of test strips. Someone here would be around to guide you if we asked you to do that.

Let's see what Marje and the group come up with for a plan.

I agree on changing your SS to say 0.1 for the units instead of 1D. It will be clearer.

Kris, one more thing. Would you please create a profile for Harley?

Instructions are here How to create a profile. You mentioned some previous health issues and a profile is a great place to list issues like that. It will give us more background info to refer to when we make suggestions. Thanks,
 
Re: 7/17 Harley "NEW": 95 AMPS/441 PMPS

Hi Kris

Just wanted to let you know we are discussing it. Until we have a plan to suggest for your consideration, just keep shooting the current dose unless he goes below 50. If you are going to be around to monitor and you get a low blue or a green number at preshot, please don't feed him but post here for help. It would be good if we could help you shoot those lower numbers and see how he responds.

We all have to read through the lengthy health thread and we have jobs so we will do the best we can to get back to you ASAP.
 
Re: 7/17 Harley "NEW": 95 AMPS/441 PMPS

Thank you, Rhiannon, for posting all those links! Great job.

Kris: Jill, one of our most experienced members, looked at Harley's SS and also felt that shooting the current dose (.1u?) consistently will give you a better idea of how he is actually doing. He appears to be bouncing off the low numbers which is compounded by the skipped shots.

Do you remember when I suggested you front load his cycles? Jill felt that was a good suggestion and was wondering if you were trying that? If you are, it would be helpful if you could annotate it on his SS. A lot of people will just put an asterisk in the + column when the kitty was fed so if you feed at PS and +1, put an asterisk in them. You can also note the amount and % carbs you fed in the remarks section. Here is my post regarding the feeding:

Buy a higher low carb food such as Wellness chicken/herring (6%) or turkey/salmon (6%) or Merrick cowboy Cookout (5%). If his weight is good based on what you have been feeding him, divide the daily food he gets into two portions. One portion for the a.m. Cycle and one for the p.m. Cycle. Then try to "front load" the cycle. In other words, from the cycle portion, feed him at preshot, +1, +2, +3. I think it works best to feed him a bit more at PS and +1 and the remainder at +2 and +3. Your goal is to slow the drops. It might not happen overnight. You will have to test a little more early on. I would always get a +2 test if I were you to see how fast he's coming down but I'd also get a +3 test. See if the food slows him some.

If you can slow him down a bit, he might not get so low. He might even require a little higher LOW carb food than I have suggested. Every cat is different in how carb sensitive they are.
Click to expand...

Jill also agreed that we need to help you learn to shoot those blue and green numbers because it will help him in the long run. She said on days that you get called out, you could leave out higher carb food for him during the time you are gone.

The goal is to use food management and shooting consistently to flatten the overall curve. We can re-evaluate where he is after that.

Any questions? I hope this is helpful.
 
Re: 7/17 Harley "NEW": 95 AMPS/441 PMPS

FYI I don't think she has bought syringes with 1/2unit markings which may make the small doses harder to see?
 
Re: 7/17 Harley "NEW": 95 AMPS/441 PMPS

Wow!
Thank you Wendy for prompting me to post here, you are right, lots of eyes! :)

So here is our deal...there are times I can be flexible with my work schedule and be up most of the night or home most of the day...and then there are times where that is not the case. It's just the nature of my job :(

We have a multi cat household, so leaving food out isn't really an option. I have tried locking Harley up but he gets very stressed/unruly as do the others, they are quite co-dependant...and eat each others food. Feed time is real interesting around here.

I am not positive my "1 drop" is truly 1 unit, but I can change that :) It is basically under the "0" line on the syringe...basically just the hub airspace. Would different syringes help even though I haven't made it past the 0 line yet? (I do have a photo on another post of the "one drop" I have been giving him)

We are very nervous to mix food due to prior health issues with Harley, and our others. If I feed him in solitude while I am here we could try it, but it wouldn't work when I wasn't home. Harley inhales anything the second it is set out anyhow :(


I can do a spreadsheet, I had actually started a Bio but then got swamped with work. Here is my work in progress:

"We rescued Harley in October of 2003. He was roughly 2 years old and 24 lbs, granted he is a very large frame cat (DSH x Maine Coon mix) he was overweight. His a character, loves to cuddle, loves to play, loves "facewashes", loves to headbutt and loves to EAT. Had to build a separate box that he couldn't get into but my other two grazers could because they were losing weight due to Harley inhaling their food. We made it work and over time he lost 6 lbs.

In 2009 Harley suddenly turned yellow. Not sure what prompted it, rushed him to his regular vet, dx was Pancreatitis/Cholangiohepatitis/Hepatic Lipidosis. We couldn't get him to eat and within 12 hrs we were at the Emergency Vet and he was hospitalized. They put in a feed tube and he was hospitalized for 7 days. They got him stabilized and he came home to be fed every 4 hours via the tube (for 8 weeks). We finally weaned him off of it and he has been healthy and happy ever since.

A year prior (8/12) we had him in because he had some hind end pain and they ran a battery of tests to find some hip/back arthritis and his blood sugar was somewhat elevated at 220...but attributed it to bad car ride and pain.

Until two months ago (4/1/13) we noticed he was not crazy about his food for about a week, it was a new bag that was sold on the expiration date, I took it back and he started eating the new bag more willingly. We found a lot of urine in the litterboxes but had changed his siblings Hyperthyroid meds and thought it was him (partly wrong). He looked suddenly thinner than normal and one day we noticed he had a wobble in the back end..but he does have some hip dysplasia so we thought it was that, but decided to take him in regardless (he HATES the 20 min car ride to the vet so I avoid it unless it seems necessary). His results all came back good except his BG was 427. They kept him for 3 nights and after testing determined he only needed 1 unit in the evening for now because 2x day was too much. We changed from a dry food (Blue Buffalo Basics Turkey/Sweet Potato) diet to ONLY wet food (Wellness Turkey)."
 
Re: 7/17 Harley "NEW": 248 PMPS, 172 +4

On a positive note his PMPS was 248 and his +4 was 172....yay blue!! :)
 
Hi, Kris.

I've been following along with Harley's SS and been part of the discussion w/ Marje and Jill. I'm glad that you've been holding the dose. I'd like to see how Harley does on this dose tonight. If things stay the same, it may be worth considering a dose increase.

I'd also suggest starting a new thread (we call them condos) for any new day when you post. We recommend one condo per cat per day.
 
Ahh I couldn't remember how the condo's work...so I'd just been changing the title of this thread LOL

It's weird, sometimes the smallest dose drops him a lot...but lately he seems to be holding slightly higher numbers?
 
Well on the same dose he's been coming down and now we have seen blue and greens today....might even end up shooting low?? Or do I skip...or cut the dose some??
 
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