asher-shocking good numbers
- Thread starter donnahc
- Start date
- Status
donnahc
Very Active Member
I must admit it scared me a little bit, was not expecting this at all and naturally it’s on a crazy busy afternoon when we are trying to make the last fed ex pickup, and I am trying to get out of the house for festival. Yes well, I’ll take it gladly. Just want to make sure he’s on the rise before I leave. Tom will be with him all night but you know, mothers worry 
Angela&Henry
Very Active Member
Just when you think you've got Asher figured out.....
he throws you a curve ball; but in this case a good one!
I would be a little afraid too, but mostly shocked.
Have a great weekend.
he throws you a curve ball; but in this case a good one!
I would be a little afraid too, but mostly shocked.
Have a great weekend.
Sue and Oliver (GA)
Very Active Member
:RAHCAT :RAHCAT :RAHCAT Yeah for Asher!
Ginny & Alex
Very Active Member
Donna, Those are GREAT numbers, but they would scare me too. Alex and I haven't seen green yet.
Kelly & Oscar
Very Active Member
great numbers for you guys! Glad to see it :mrgreen:
Rob & Harley (GA)
Very Active Member
Yay for green.
judy and squamee(GA)
Very Active Member
:thumbup dancing_cat :thumbup great numbers! And enjoy the festival!
Rob & Harley (GA)
Very Active Member
This is a real cliff hanger. You give us greens and then leave us hanging for the whooooooole weekend. Ugg :sad: !
donnahc
Very Active Member
Sorry to keep you guys hanging over the weekend. It’s gonna be spotty with me posting Fri nights/weekends until late Aug after Philly Folk Fest. Tom does a fab job testing and shooting and taking care of the kitties but I don’t want to ask him to have to post too.
Asher had a real long ride on Friday. He was still 90 at +11 but by +12.5 back up to 219 so Tom shot then. It really caught us off guard on a busy crazy day but so happy for some green :mrgreen:
Weekend was “normal" for Asher (whatever that is) but Sunday night he hit 300 again. Who knows why. (maybe we shouldn’t have shot 3.0 on friday night, but sunday night would be a late expression of a .1 reduction a day prior?) This is what frustrates me but we press on. He was back down to his mid 200s for amps this morning. (spreadsheet is now current)
We have had abnormal high heat indexes here in PA, over 100 degrees and high humidity, but have had the a/c on in the house for the kitties.
(me sleeping in a tent this weekend was interesting)
I have read the think tank thread on under dosing. Anyone think we need to increase? My vet is really against it (he is afraid of hypo), but is always happy when he sees the progress we have made on the spreadsheet.
Asher went down to 60 at +9 on Friday with no warning and had been on the same dose for quite some time. I just don’t know if we need to be more aggressive here or if we stay on the 3.1 path. For now we have decided to stay with ProZync so I want to do the best job we can with it. It is frustrating there is no protocol with this insulin but I think we have made good progress with much help from you guys.
Asher had a real long ride on Friday. He was still 90 at +11 but by +12.5 back up to 219 so Tom shot then. It really caught us off guard on a busy crazy day but so happy for some green :mrgreen:
Weekend was “normal" for Asher (whatever that is) but Sunday night he hit 300 again. Who knows why. (maybe we shouldn’t have shot 3.0 on friday night, but sunday night would be a late expression of a .1 reduction a day prior?) This is what frustrates me but we press on. He was back down to his mid 200s for amps this morning. (spreadsheet is now current)
We have had abnormal high heat indexes here in PA, over 100 degrees and high humidity, but have had the a/c on in the house for the kitties.
(me sleeping in a tent this weekend was interesting)
I have read the think tank thread on under dosing. Anyone think we need to increase? My vet is really against it (he is afraid of hypo), but is always happy when he sees the progress we have made on the spreadsheet.
Asher went down to 60 at +9 on Friday with no warning and had been on the same dose for quite some time. I just don’t know if we need to be more aggressive here or if we stay on the 3.1 path. For now we have decided to stay with ProZync so I want to do the best job we can with it. It is frustrating there is no protocol with this insulin but I think we have made good progress with much help from you guys.
judy and squamee(GA)
Very Active Member
Sounds like you are doing just great---except for sleeping in a tent in the heat! :shock:
Joanna & Bix (GA)
Very Active Member
was anything different the Day of Pretty Greens? It certainly does confuse the picture. I'd tend to try 1 drop more insulin and see where it goes. He didn't go too low that day, and right now it looks like a fluke day. Maybe he didn't eat well, or maybe his pancreas got Supercat powers that day and decided to work? Who knows, but I know I had a hard time dosing with Bix when he would have one random good cycle but then no others, I was always scared he would mysteriously drop to low numbers if I raised the dose, but it never happened. With him at least, those random cycles were just that, and really never recurred.
donnahc
Very Active Member
Joanna, I think the only difference in Asher’s day to day lately has been the crazy hot temps and humidity we have had here and mostly, he eats a slightly different amount of food every day.
We feed 3/4 small can (3.5 oz) of food per cat, per meal. The only other food they get is baked chicken as a snack. We feed twice daily before shooting, but after we feed, not every cat cleans their dish entirely. Alby likes to come back to finish later when his brother isn’t there. Asher comes back about two hours later and cleans up whatever is left, usually. We get a mid day chicken snack and a snack around 3am. Sometimes the cats want it, and sometimes they leave it sit. So basically I’d say we do a very modified free feed. I only put a certain amount of food out a few times a day, but they graze on it and eat out of each other’s dishes, and mostly eat what they feel like which differs a bit every day.
I don’t know how I could be more rigid about making sure Asher eats the same amount every day but I am suspecting this is the only environmental difference each day with how he reacts to insulin. He’s a pretty calm dude (unless we are going to the vet) so he doesn’t get fired up about storms or people coming over, etc. At least that we can see.
I wonder if I need to come up with a changing dose now based on his preshot, like if he is 160 he gets 3 units, if he is 200 he gets 3.1, if he is 260 he gets 3.2, etc.
We seem to have done better holding a dose with him, but that is maybe because we are closer to his ideal dose now since we have been holding. Does anyone think this idea has some merit or have I not had enuf coffee this morning?
How does the protocol work on the L’s, is it similar in that you dose on a preshot or a nadir number?
We feed 3/4 small can (3.5 oz) of food per cat, per meal. The only other food they get is baked chicken as a snack. We feed twice daily before shooting, but after we feed, not every cat cleans their dish entirely. Alby likes to come back to finish later when his brother isn’t there. Asher comes back about two hours later and cleans up whatever is left, usually. We get a mid day chicken snack and a snack around 3am. Sometimes the cats want it, and sometimes they leave it sit. So basically I’d say we do a very modified free feed. I only put a certain amount of food out a few times a day, but they graze on it and eat out of each other’s dishes, and mostly eat what they feel like which differs a bit every day.
I don’t know how I could be more rigid about making sure Asher eats the same amount every day but I am suspecting this is the only environmental difference each day with how he reacts to insulin. He’s a pretty calm dude (unless we are going to the vet) so he doesn’t get fired up about storms or people coming over, etc. At least that we can see.
I wonder if I need to come up with a changing dose now based on his preshot, like if he is 160 he gets 3 units, if he is 200 he gets 3.1, if he is 260 he gets 3.2, etc.
We seem to have done better holding a dose with him, but that is maybe because we are closer to his ideal dose now since we have been holding. Does anyone think this idea has some merit or have I not had enuf coffee this morning?
How does the protocol work on the L’s, is it similar in that you dose on a preshot or a nadir number?
dmartini4
Very Active Member
Just a thought that has been bothering me...I know we are not supposed to shoot the low numbers...
what if we had the 90 preshot and shot a reduced dose to keep him from going up?
jsut something I have been thinking about...
why do we let them go up when we are trying to get them down
say if we shot 1 unit into the 90...has anyone ever tried?
what if we had the 90 preshot and shot a reduced dose to keep him from going up?
jsut something I have been thinking about...
why do we let them go up when we are trying to get them down
say if we shot 1 unit into the 90...has anyone ever tried?
judy and squamee(GA)
Very Active Member
At a ps of 90 you are only 50 points above hypo numbers. Hard to imagine being sure enough that there is enough margin for error, even with a lot of data.
Joanna & Bix (GA)
Very Active Member
Sliding scales can work really well when you get the doses right - the reason I don't usually advocate for it is that I think there is a tendency to undershoot, and then just have a scale that is all about undershooting. When the scale is designed to get you to a green nadir from any PS (tho doing so from high ones isn't the greatest idea IMO), then it can work well. If you have the data to support the doses, that is the way to do it.
For Asher I think you can go either way - hold the dose, try a sliding scale, or try mostly holding the dose and maybe lowering a little just for the lowest PSs. It's all just try and see what works as you get more data. It is tougher when they don't respond consistently.
If you haven't already, I would read the L stickies and protocols. You can't apply it 1 to 1 to PZI (particularly with the lower PSs, which they can shoot), but a whole lot of it does apply. I found it really really helpful to read stuff like that to have some kind of framework. Mostly I think they dose by nadirs - if you start getting numbers under 40 or 50 you decrease the dose, otherwise you are either holding or increasing.
There are some who have shot PZI at low PSs, but only people with expertise, experience, and consistent cats. I was always too chicken to try it, and personally I would not have tried under 100, but maybe at something like 110 and up. The couple times I did do something like that (newbie errors) I regretted it, not b/c Bix went low, but b/c I was panicked he would and tested every hour, so to me, not even worth the stress to try it. I wouldn't recommend it to anyone, but if someone did do it, I think you would need to know a lot about your cat's onset and nadir timing, as well as zoom rate. I don't think many people know that stuff very well, in large part b/c it seems like few cats get a very predictable response on ProZinc, and in part too b/c we don't really emphasize testing a lot for onset, nadir, or zoom (see #1 on unpredictable response above, lol!).
For Asher I think you can go either way - hold the dose, try a sliding scale, or try mostly holding the dose and maybe lowering a little just for the lowest PSs. It's all just try and see what works as you get more data. It is tougher when they don't respond consistently.
If you haven't already, I would read the L stickies and protocols. You can't apply it 1 to 1 to PZI (particularly with the lower PSs, which they can shoot), but a whole lot of it does apply. I found it really really helpful to read stuff like that to have some kind of framework. Mostly I think they dose by nadirs - if you start getting numbers under 40 or 50 you decrease the dose, otherwise you are either holding or increasing.
There are some who have shot PZI at low PSs, but only people with expertise, experience, and consistent cats. I was always too chicken to try it, and personally I would not have tried under 100, but maybe at something like 110 and up. The couple times I did do something like that (newbie errors) I regretted it, not b/c Bix went low, but b/c I was panicked he would and tested every hour, so to me, not even worth the stress to try it. I wouldn't recommend it to anyone, but if someone did do it, I think you would need to know a lot about your cat's onset and nadir timing, as well as zoom rate. I don't think many people know that stuff very well, in large part b/c it seems like few cats get a very predictable response on ProZinc, and in part too b/c we don't really emphasize testing a lot for onset, nadir, or zoom (see #1 on unpredictable response above, lol!).
- Status