fructosamine question

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Shelly_F

Member Since 2022
Got a question about fructosamine. What are your thoughts on a fructosamine that is under 90. Yes under 90. I just can't wrap my head around that number.
 
Well, that’s lower than the low end of the reference range for a non-diabetic cat, and well below what would be considered a well regulated diabetic cat that is on insulin.

Reference ranges for fructosamine test

Usually the fructosamine is run to hep diagnosis diabetes, when caregivers have seen some signs and symptoms at home and have brought their cat in to be checked by their vet. You didn’t provide any context, is that your situation, or is your cat on insulin? What did your vet say? 90 is well out of the range for a treated diabetic cat, which I believe may suggest overdosing.
 
I know what fructosamine is. It just that number was like WOW! She is a diabetic with newly dx hyperthyroidism and her first fructosamine after being dx hyper. and being on a low dose of the hyper med, shows that she is now less than 90. Since all of her prior test were in the 350-425 range.
 
That’s good, I’m glad you know what the fructosamine test is, I was merely providing you with some details in that regard since your original post did not really specify and it wasn’t clear to me :). Yes, it is low for a diabetic cat. Knowing now that your cat is indeed diabetic, if you aren’t testing BG at home, I would suggest you should, since that fructosamine would seem to indicate prolonged hypoglycaemia has been occurring over the last 2-3 weeks. As I noted above what did your vet think? Was this low number a concern to them?
 
From what I understand, hyperthyroidism is often considered a cause for insulin resistance, which would then mean consistently higher BG numbers. Since that doesn’t seem to be the case, I still wonder about the dose being too high, given the fructosamine value being so low. I’m surprised that the vet didn’t say anything about that low fructosamine value in connection with the possibility that it would indicate prolonged hypoglycaemia. Just a suggestion, since you haven’t shared any BG data, but current home tests will help assess whether the dose you are currently giving is too high or just fine. You may have the data, but without being able to see it, that’s as much as I can offer :). That low of a fructosamine for a diabetic cat on insulin says something, IMHO. Particularly too with the treatment of hyperT bringing the thyroid levels back down, whatever previous affect because the thyroid levels were out of whack no longer influences the BG values in the same way as before getting the T4 levels improved.
 
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The data is all lost because I had a computer that crashed and the data I did have is unrecoverable. We do not test at home anymore because she fights us to get blood from her and we go through 4-5 strips and it stresses her and both me and my husband so we have decided since she is 17 and does not have much time left we don't do home testing anymore. We were planning to put her to sleep a month ago but she is still here so we test her urine instead.
 
The other possibility is that it was a bad test. Was there any indication on the lab report that there was clumping or lipemia? Usually there's a note if the blood tests were run by an outside lab.
 
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