No worries Lori, I think it's good to have open discussion, and the more we can get the interpretations out there, the better I think it is for everyone! Today's #s just look to me like not enough insulin. I think his body has already decided 1u doesn't give it enough of an insulin high. :mrgreen: (to use your (was that you?) drug addict analogy...)
Seriously, is it 3 cycles or 3 days, the start low and go slow says 1 week and I can't find anything on the Prozinc website that gives any real information about duration, etc.
The million dollar question! :lol: Everyone has their own view really. PZI's flexibility is awesome, but it can be a headache in some ways. In my mind, you can change the dose with every shot if you want. I don't usually recommend that when people are starting out, b/c it's a nightmare to interpret the data if you are doing that, and it can be hard to get good results. But for those who can make it work, it can be useful. To me the value in holding a dose is to allow any possible overlap to build up. Some cats get some, some don't. For Bix, I would often see better PSs by cycle 3 of a new dose, so I liked to hold for 4 cycles before raising again (and his breakthrough moment came on cycle 4).
You can throw out the 1 week in SLGS, I think everyone will agree on that. That is old-school, and also I think SLGS says you are getting curves at the vet, so it's not even talking about home testing, where you can see each day what the dose is doing and make decisions.
I think sometimes we end up confusing people on things we agree on more here than it sounds like (maybe?). I think for the most part, we all agree that if a dose does not appear to have stabilized out - maybe PSs are improving, or nadirs are improving - then you should continue to hold that dose. If it's crystal clear that a dose isn't enough after a few days and there are no signs whatever of progress, then it's time to raise. I usually say 3 - 5 days, moving faster (raise every 3rd day) if your cat is not doing well, and if you have ketones you may need to go even faster than that.
The point IMO of waiting say 3 cycles on a dose is not because you CAN'T raise faster than that, it's b/c the results may improve on cycle 2, 3, or 4 (or possibly later). So unless you have ketones, why not wait and see before raising. But there's nothing IMO technically wrong with raising faster, you just need to be on the lookout for dramatic improvement in the #s, and I don't think most people want that stress.
And for most people, I wouldn't push to go as fast as 3 cycles unless their cat is really not doing well. If someone wants to wait 5+ days and their cat is doing ok, go for it. The reason I am pushing with Harley is b/c you got some great #s on 1.4, and I'm so excited about that LOL that I don't want to see him get stuck in pinks & yellows when the blues are right there for the taking (not saying you should be shooting quite as much as 1.4 though).
When looking at his ss he always goes high after having a good day so I was thinking that I had been a) raising the dose too fast pr b) It was too much insulin.
That is liver-training. They see good #s they aren't used to and their liver freaks out. Raising the dose slower won't help as far as I know - the only thing I know of to get them through liver training is to force them to stay in good #s for extended stretches of time, and then the liver starts settling down.
If however you saw high #s after a true hypo #, or after a really sharp drop, that could be real rebound rather than liver training, and a sign the dose is too high. I haven't seen that in Harley's #s.
I was afraid that by upping the dose every 3 cycles I may have zoomed past the perfect dose by not letting it settle long enough.
That can happen, but you would see it in the #s. You would either see rebound #s, or you would see highish flat #s. There might be other patterns too. But I don't see that in Harley's #s, because you are seeing a great response on 1.4, and then you can see where you pull back to 1.2 say, that the response isn't as good, and then when you shot 1.4 again you got a pattern suggesting the dose is a hair too high (+12 lower than mid-cycle #) but you still got good action. To me it confirms that 1.4 is the closest you've seen to the right dose for him, but is a tiny bit too high. I'm not seeing any roller-coaster in the #s.
, just curious why you aren't shooting something pretty close to 1.4? I totally support you doing what you need to to make sense of all of it and get the data you need, I certainly did that myself along the way. I'm just wondering if maybe your concerns are something that can be addressed without losing progress.