Confused by BG readings

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loneranger

Member Since 2014
I am confused by the variance in BG readings that I am getting from Mitzi my 10 year old. Some background - She was showing symptoms of diabetes (excessive thirst & urine) and had been on dry food her entire life. I now know that this was not good for her. I tested her urine for ketones and the result was negative, her urine glucose was maximum on the color scale. On January 1st I switched her over to low carb canned food, which she eats readily, she is not finicky about the change at all. Her excessive thirst and urination has subsided. I have an appointment with my vet on Monday January 6. I began home testing her blood glucose on January 2nd using a Relion Confirm, thinking I would be able to provide the vet with some information. These are the results:

Jan. 3
Prior to morning meal (10h fast) 392 mg/dl
1 hour after mid day meal 183 mg/dl
Late evening 351 mg/dl

Jan. 4
Prior to morning meal 395 mg/dl
2 hours after mid day meal 187 mg/dl and a sample taken 4 minutes later in the opposite ear 169 mg/dl

Is it normal for there to be a variance of 18 points (10%) in two samples taken essentially at the same time?
Also, wouldn't you expect a rise in BG after a meal and not a drop? It seems to me that the pancreas must be secreting some insulin. Could this be due to the change in diet? Any information would be greatly appreciated. To be clear she is not yet on any treatment. Thanks
 
So she is not on insulin? (my other comments would be guided by this answer so I'll wait for it. :-D

All meters have a possible 20% variance from one test to the next so, no, your numbers are not unusual.
 
Doesn't sound like she is on insulin yet but it sounds like she might need some given these numbers - normal cats are 50-130.

What type and brand of wet food are you feeding now? No dry at all right? not even treats?

Wendy
 
The FDA allows meters to read within 20% of what a lab would get.

This means each test represents a range of numbers from + to - 20%.
If 2 test ranges overlap, they may be considered the same.

Test if the low number * 1.2 winds up greater than the high number * 0.8. If yes, the numbers may be consdiered the same.

Ie if (Low number * 1.2) > (high number * 0.8) is true the numbers are the same due to meter variance.
 
Mitzi is not on insulin yet. I am feeding her Fancy Feast Classic or Wellness Core canned food. No dry food at all. Thanks for the info on the meter standards.
 
At higher numbers, that range gets really wide! It doesn't matter then; high is high and you'll want to figure out what steps to take.

Ex
50 -> 40 to 60
500 -> 400 to 600
 
That's good food in terms of carbs but she sounds like she will need some help with insulin. It may only be temporary even as many cats do go into remission in a few months with a low carb diet, home testing and a good insulin. You want lantus levemir or prozinc.
 
She drops after eating which might mean her pancreas is working a little. We generally say a cat is regulated if they are in the mid 200s at preshot and under 100 at nadir, on insulin. A cat in remission can range from 40 - 120, with the majority of the time in double digits, off insulin.

So she is in diabetic numbers. Does she have any kind of infection?

It might be that a little bit of insulin would give her the chance for remission. If she were mine, I would ask for one of the insulins Wendy suggested. The thought is that you have a limited window for her pancreas to heal, and insulin gives it that chance.
 
Just returned from Mitzi's visit to the vet. I gave him the BG results from four days of home testing, and after looking at them he said that there may be another reason for what he considered to be wide swings in the BG results. Today for example the morning pre meal BG was 408 and mid day 3 hours after eating was 112. He said it could be a problem with her liver, so he ordered a blood panel and should have the results tomorrow or Wednesday. He did not take a BG while we were there. He also said that her being overweight could be interfering with insulin uptake. We also discussed diet and he mentioned more than once the use of a prescribed diabetes specific food. When I said that I was feeding her Fancy Feast because it was low carb, he winced and said what mattered was what was digestible not just the % composition. He did acknowledge that low carb was important. He also mentioned remission may be achieved with a combination of diet and insulin. Bottom line, we left without knowing what the next move is until the lab results are in
 
You might point him to the food chart at Cat Info.

And if you want to tilt the food composition towards higher protein and less fat, Dr Pierson states you can add about 20 to 25% plain poultry or meat to the food, then portion out as needed.

She has a whole section on safe weight loss, too.

Good luck with the liver function.
 
I just talked to my vet and except for the BG which he said was not "sky high" (it was 217) everything else was in normal range - liver, pancreas, and kidney function. In fact he said her profile was that of a much younger cat.
He is still unsure of the reason for the extreme variance in high and low readings from home testing, so he wants me to continue to home test her morning and evenings for 2 weeks and see if we can see a pattern. I told him that her last two BG were 148 and 116. The readings seem to be stabilizing recently. He wants her to be on canned Purina DM during this time, and to have his office take a BG after the 2 week period, unless I see a spike in BG while testing her at home. I looked at Dr. Pierson's cat food nutrition chart and the Purina DM looks to have a similar profile to what I am feeding her now. He seemed very confident that this could be managed by diet with perhaps only needing some insulin depending on what the home testing shows. I can see a marked improvement in Mitzi over the past week, she is more alert than she has been recently and her urine volume has dropped to what it was before this all started. She needs to lose weight, but I will wait to see how this BG issue goes first. So some good news! If nothing else I have learned the critical importance of diet.
 
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