Help please, newbie to home testing

[suki & crystal (GA)]

Hi everyone

I found your excellent forum from the Catinfo website. My darling little 9 year old tabby Crystal was diagnosed about 6 weeks ago. My vet started her on a low dose of Caninsulin as her initial blood glucose test was 3.68 g/L (we live in France, hence this method). We are now at 4.43 g/L taken last week with 2 doses of 8 units each morning and evening of Caninsulin. I have just started home testing, first sample taken this afternoon before her feed and insulin, bless her she sat very still while I jabbed her ear several times. I am using the One Touch Verio IQ monitor and today's reading was 24.1 mmol/L. Does anyone know how I convert this reading to a g/L reading so as to be comparative with my vet's tests? Also when is the best time to test? I hope to be able to get a week's summary before my next visit to my vet and will try for before breakfast and injection, about 6 hours later and again before her evening injection. Unfortunately she shows signs of hyperglycaemia (she has lost a lot of weight, her coat is poor and she is always ravanously hungry) and free feeds during the day (we also have 3 other cats). Currently I am feeding canned wet food - not a very good choice here in France, but am using Friskies terrines or Felex pouches but am unable to find the carb levels of either of these foods. Once she is stabilised I hope to be able to prepare semi cooked chicken and rabbit but I'm worried about changing her to a low carb diet too drastically as she is not responding well to the insulin at the moment anyway. My vet thinks she may be insulin resistant and we may try "Glipigid" pills (not sure if I have spelt that right, I can't read his writing very well). I'm okay doing the insulin injections but must admit to being stressed out by the home testing - I'm so frightened of getting it wrong, I just want her to be well again. Any advice would be most welcome. I've had a diabetic cat before when we lived in the UK and he went into remission and lived to a ripe old age of 20 but Crystal seems to be altogether a different problem.
Thanks, Suki and Crystal

 

[BJM]

Caninsulin may last only 8-10 hours in the cat. If you are home testing, you'll see that by a steep increase when it wears off. You can work around that sometimes by giving insulin roughly every 8 hours. Better insulins you might have available are 2 human insulins - Lantus or Levemir - or Hypurion PZI - which act much longer.

Sometimes, if you give too much insulin, you will trigger compensatory hormones which release stored glucose. We call it a 'bounce'. It can take about 3 days to wear off.

Numbers at the vet may be 5.5 - 10.0 mmol/dL (100-180 mg/dL) higher due to vet stress.

If the Friskies terrines are pates, you may be OK. Here is a post on European food options.

Don't worry about converting to the vet's numbers because we have approximate feline reference numbers for human glucometers as follows.

[Glucose reference ranges are unsubstantiated and have been removed by Moderator]

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Examples of using the chart:

Ex. You are a new insulin user and you test your cat before giving insulin. The test is 300. It probably is safe to give insulin.

Ex. You are an established user of Lantus, following the Tight Regulation protocol. You've tested around +5 to +7 to spot the nadir. It is 200 mg/dL. You probably need to increase the dose, following the instructions for the protocol.

Ex. Your cat is acting funny. The eyes are a bit dilated. You are concerned and test the glucose. The number is 35 mg/dL. ACK! The cat may be in a hypoglycemic state. You quickly follow the HYPO protocol linked in the glucose reference values chart. (which we really, really, suggest you print out and post on your refrigerator.)

 

[suki & crystal (GA)]

Thanks for your help, there is so much to absorb, but it's a great help to find other people are having the same problems adjusting to a new lifestyle. Managed to get a test this morning but unfortunately we will out most of the day but aim for a day's testing tomorrow. Will be back looking at the forum tomorrow.
Suki & Crystal

 

[BJM]

We recommend you always test before giving a shot, to make sure the cat is not too low to give insulin. For new insulin users, we set a no shot level of 200 mg/dL.

Whenever possible, you need to test in the middle of the cycle to see how low the glucose goes (the nadir) . Caninsulin is a mix of 2 different duration length insulins, so there can be 2 nadirs with it, around +4 to +5 hours post shot and around +7 to +8 hours post shot. It depends on the cat, the dose, the food, etc. In some cats on Caninsulin, better control may be achieved with TID or every 8 hour dosing.

As you get data in the middle of the inter-shot period (aka cycle), you will see if you may need to adjust the dose and if you can safely reduce your no shot level.