You are doing great. My kitties were on Novalin N. But you ar correct- test, feed, then 30 minutes later shoot. My vet didn't give me those directions either.
Yes, this is the way to start but you need to test, feed, wait for 30 minutes, then inject.
It's very easy to miss the good dose if you start high and increase by 1 unit at a time. That's why generally we recommend starting at 1 u twice a day and only increase in 0.25 u fractions. My cat was around 13 pounds at diagnosis and he was started at 1 u twice a day.
Did she say a reading of 10 before insulin or when the insulin is at its peak effect? When Caninsulin (Vetsulin) is working as it should, the BG will start at its highest point just before injection time, decline gradually to its lowest value about 4 to 6 hours later and then gradually rise to another high point just before the second injection of the day. It's the low value that can be a worry - too low can cause an episode of hypoglycemia that can be fatal.
One of the other posters above mentioned a few conditions that can cause a kitty to need this much insulin. These are relatively rare conditions and special tests are needed to find out if they are present. If those are not factors in your kitty's health status then 9 units twice a day is a VERY high dose. That's what worries us. A kitty might tolerate it for a while because of internal processes that keep BG propped up - often artificially high - and then those processes can't do it anymore and the kitty crashes.
Confirmation of overdosing requires a log of BG data at a range of doses over a lengthy period of time. Ketone testing will tell you whether your kitty is at risk of developing a complication of unregulated diabetes called diabetic ketoacidosis.
Negative on the ketones is great. Don't worry about the glucose part of the strip. Testing BG with the ear prick is the way to assess that.
From what I understand 100-199 is the place to be and he isn't even close to there.
I'm sorry to say this - again - but the numbers on your spreadsheet tell me that your kitty's dose is too high. I hope you have read the information posted above by Critter Mom about dosing Caninsulin/Vetsulin. Those are the manufacturer's guidelines. It would be a good idea to go directly to those websites, print out the dosing guidelines and take them to your vet. We really don't want your kitty to have a hypo episode.Hi All! I've done quite a bit of BG checks over the last few days and so far everything is still fairly high regardless of time. I haven't noticed him getting so low that he's in the danger zone at all but I do notice how his sugar drops after injections.
Although the numbers are high I have noticed that they are quite a bit lower than the readings done at the vet so I'm assuming he must be stressed when he has to go there.
I'm no expert but the numbers seem to suggest to me that caninsulin may not be the fix for him
This...is disgraceful. Bearing in mind that we, as lay-people with no formal training, can get a blood sample without causing this sort of damage, I'm horrified that any vet or tech would test this way. I do sincerely hope this isn't common practice and isn't happening to anyone else here!
That's awful. And really just goes to show that, although the majority of vets really do want to help our babies, there are some who just don't have the sort of caring and careful attitude we need. But you and your boys are doing awesomely well without them - and the credit for that goes to you for taking control of the situation and getting them well again.
nits not like he doesn't know who lives here. We've lived on the same street for 18 years! And the population of our town is 3000.
That's a wise move. Have you tried urine ketone testing yet?
[Emphasis mine]
That's a wise move. Have you tried urine ketone testing yet?
Please post your BG numbers on your spreadsheet and if you can get some tests between AM and PM doses or through the evening that would be very useful. It shouldn't take many cycles (the 12 hours between doses) before we know whether the 1 u dose needs to be raised.
Can you do some mid-cycle testing on Davey today? While he might simply run high all day, it's also possible that he might drop fast to too low a number before bouncing back up.
I recommend in the strongest terms that you do not make any changes whatsoever to Davey's diet for the time being: if the dose is too high then his current diet will be doing something to protect him from a potential adverse event. If you were to reduce the carb load in his food it could greatly increase his risk of having a hypo episode.
I completely agree, Mogs. The first day Rosa was on insulin, I'd been told by the vet to give her 2u and remove all the dry food from her diet immediately! As luck would have it, I'd given her first dose and fought my way through trying to get wet food into her before I found the FDMB.
Fortunately, the great people here were very quick off the mark to tell me that because the dose I'd been told to give was double what it should have been, and I had no way of testing until the following day, I had to give her the dry food back until I could make sure she was safe through a diet change.
