We've actually ordered the glucose meter kit and expect it here next week
Oh we all wished you'd replied sooner about your interest in home testing!! I don't know where you ordered your blood glucose meter from, but most of us just run to WalMart and pick up a Relion Prime or Confirm meter and a bunch of test strips! The human meters are regulated by the government to be accurate enough for people, so they're accurate enough for our cats!
The meters themselves cost about $15, and a package of 50 of the Relion Prime strips is $9....Relion Confirm (requires a smaller amount of blood) strips are about $39 for 50.
Most vets only know of the Alphatrak meter....the only thing "wrong" with this meter is the cost of the test strips is outrageous! A lot of us test multiple times per day, and at over $1 per strip, you can see how that would run into a lot of money very quickly. You can do your "curves" at home by testing every 2 hours through an entire cycle (so 6 tests) and save that money you'd be paying the vet too. Doing curves at the vet isn't ideal...stress from being packed into a carrier, driven to the vet and just the general craziness of a vets office can increase the readings 100 points or more. Then the vet bases dosage on those numbers, and when you go home, BG returns to non-stressed levels and you're giving too much.
If you DO get the Alphatrak and decide to use it as your meter, please make sure to add that you're using the Alphatrak to your signature line so we know. It reads about 30 points higher than human meters, so if we see a number under 80 on an Alpha, it's the same as a number under 50 on ours..and means your cat needs a reduction in insulin...as well as some immediate attention to make sure to get the numbers back up a little.
Our vet has asked us not to make too many adjustments to Spider's food until we are home testing because she increased his insulin and does not want to run the risk of him going hypo on us.
This just seems outright bizarre to me. If your vet recognizes that adjusting to a low carb diet will bring the BG numbers down, why would they increase the insulin? Seems the safer thing to do is hold whatever dose you were at and see how the food change affects Spiders numbers, NOT increase the dose when you already "understand" that the food change can bring the BG levels down! At this point, I'm afraid for Spider since you're not home testing YET, and your vet has increased insulin while you're reducing carbs in his diet :? :shock:
Last bit of advice..check out the links to the Cat Food charts that were posted earlier. We recommend feeding foods less than 10% carbs, and Science Diet isn't on that list...and we've already discussed the Blue Wilderness foods...those we just don't know about (which is too bad...they're not terribly expensive and look pretty good, but without knowing more about them, they could be 2% carb...they could be 22%)
BJM said:
The label is weight based.
We go by
percentage of calories from protein, fat, and carbohydrates. That info isn't on the label; you have to get it from the manufacturer. Dr Lisa Pierson has collected this, done the calculations, and compiled a document containg the results on her web site
Cat Info.
For background info on the calculations and some much earlier food lists, check
Binky's Page.
(if he'll allow us to home test. Our fingers are crossed!
We ALL worry about this one!! But the vast majority of our kitties adapt very well to being tested at home, and lots of them are so into the routine, they remind US it's time to test!! We have all kinds of advice on learning how to home test, as well as how to work with "difficult" cats to get them to accept it. At this point, if you're going to wait for the vet to do a curve, and wait for the meter, you might as well be working on setting up the routine.
1. Pick the place in your home you're going to want to test/shoot. (maybe your bed, a rug or pillow on the floor, on a counter or wherever is best for you and Spider to be comfortable
2. Arm yourself with lots of treats....a lot of members use freeze dried chicken or boil their own, or get some from a deli...whatever your cat LOVES, but is also low carb
3. Take Spider to the spot and just rub his ears. Whether for a split second or an hour, make sure he gets a treat for letting you fool with his ears. Some cats love having their ears rubbed...others don't want them touched, so getting them used to this and having them start to put together that letting you fool with theirs means they get a Yummy yummy treat, usually makes the whole thing much more successful
Best of luck to you and Spider...I REALLY am concerned about your vets choice to increase insulin while knowing you're decreasing carbs though, so you might want to watch Spider VERY carefully for signs of a hypo and have a hypo kit ready!
How to treat Hypos..They can kill
