A Week Without Tests - Should I Change Dose?

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Christine & KR

Christine & KR

Member Since 2012
Hello, all you experienced Lantus users! I'm in a bit of a bind and need some advice.

Kitty Rabbit will be boarding for 8 days starting this Friday. This is a first for her; in her 19 years she's always been in someone's home or had someone stay at the house while I'm out of town. I've been unable to find someone willing to give shots, however, so she's going to a boarding facility that's right next door to a vet clinic.

The facility/vet will give KR her insulin without any question. The issue (for me) is that they won't test. If KR were nicely regulated I wouldn't be too concerned, but we're not at that stage yet. Yesterday:

AMPS - 121
+3 - 144
+6 - 66
+9 - no test (wish I could've got one in there)
PMPS - 353

Today's AMPS: 272

I'm giving serious thought to dropping KR's dose from .5u BID to .25u BID for the duration of her boarding. I don't know how much she's going to eat in the strange environment, and I don't know how long it will take her to get used to being there (or if she ever will) and how much stress this is going to put on her.

Any thoughts from anyone on how to handle this situation?

Thank you all,

Christine & Kitty Rabbit
 
Hi, Christine.

Your thinking is right along the lines of what we suggest. FWIW, when I travel, I do have a cat sitter that comes by twice a day. While she can and would test, Gabby won't let her. I'm not a big fan of shooting blind but it's more important that Gabby gets her shot. So, just like you're suggesting, I drop her dose. I think having them shoot 0.25u will be fine. I would also suggest you take a photo of a 0.25u dose (or copy the photo from the New to the Group sticky) since it is a dose that's between the lines on the syringe. It will avoid any potential for miscommunication.
 
I agree with Sienne.
Show them a picture or give them an example syringe with colored fluid in it.
Shooting less than 1 unit seems to be unthought of by many of our vets and techs. They seem to question it and decide that it's a mistake.

I wonder why they won't test. You are paying them for a service.
Hope K.R. will eat and be safe. Paws crossed!!
 
I did the same with Tiggy while we were away getting married. There was no way he would let anyone test him so we dropped his dose and printed the sitter a list of things to watch for in terms of hypos. Can you have them check on KR at +6 every time to make sure he is alert and responsive?
 
When I was going out of town, I was going to board Benjamin at my backup vet clinic. They said the charge was $20 per day plus $6 per shot. When I brought him in for his pre-boarding exam, since they hadn't seen him before, I asked about testing. They said that would be an additional $25 per test! He was also super stressed there since it is a very busy clinic. I ended up leaving him at home with the other animals and my son took care of him. I lowered his dose, and he did miss a few am shots becuase my son has to go into work very early, but he did fine. He didn't let my son test him every time, but he got enough random tests that we knew he wasn't going too low.
 
Thank you, everyone.

Sienne and Rhiannon - I had already planned to print the pictures showing a .25u dose. I never thought of bringing a filled syringe as an example. Thank you for that idea! And thank you for telling me where to find those pictures; I figured I was going hunting as I couldn't remember where they were.

After all the comments here, I'll definitely ask about having KR tested at least once per cycle (~+6). That shouldn't be a problem during the day, although they may charge for it. Then again, everyone loves KR so maybe she'll charm them so much they'll lower their rates... One can hope, right? :smile:

Fingers and paws crossed this goes well and I come home to a happy, healthy, unstressed cat,

Christine
 
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