Hi Teri
I'm so so so so sorry to hear about Blue and the fact that you lost him and th tragic way he died. There is just no getting around how sad and painful that is. I'm sad for you, my soul kitty, Fred, died a year ago and I'm still sad.
Yes, your vet was wrong, and if it were done, I'd consider suing for malpractice. A human doctor could NEVER tell a human not to check their glucose--it could kill them. It might even be illegal, or a bit of advice that could get them barred from practicing medicine. Unfortunately, animals don't have the same respect or rights as human do, yet. And even though your vet was uneducated and wrong, your vet is not an anomoly and we'd have to sue the majority of them for giving the wrong, uninformed advice.
I just had a similar bad-vet-advice experience with a rescue that I saved 2 weeks ago. He was a straggly awful looking kitty named Shane (Sebastian now) who was on the kill list to be killed the next morning at the New York City animal shelter. He was in ketoacidosis and had been there at the shelter for 3 days, they were treating him sort of but not really, and now he was about to die. He clearly had some owners who had let him starve to death by not treating his diabetes (he is bone thin and the ketoacidosis was from untreated diabetes resulting in high high blood glucose numbers.) I saw his terrible picture and all I could think was that this poor little boy had experience no love--awful humans who treated him like crap--and then his final 3 days of life in the fear-filled shelter with crying cats and docs who are lonely and terrified. After Fred died and I had treated his diabetes for 5 years, I felt like it was perhaps my calling to treat the older sick animals since I could do so. But I also wanted a break because the care can be consuming. BUT, I saw this little guy and just couldn't let him get such a bad rap by humans. So I pulled him with the help of a cat-rescue group I volunteer with and picked him and immediately delivered him to the vet--not a 24 hour hospital that was well equipped but a nice vet who works with tons of rescues.
Anyway, the vet did save his life from ketoacidosis, I'll give him credit for that. But then, once he was in better condition after a week and ready to go home and be stabilized on his regular insulin, I requested that a certain insulin be used--Lantus Glargine. He said OK but hadn't used it and didn't know it. I provided him with all sorts of resources on the dosing and how it worked--all from this site. He was impressed and grateful I thought. I asked hiim to be CONSERVATIVE with the dosing. This kitty was 6 pounds!!! (Normally he would be 14 at a healthy weight I think, he's a big boned boy.) I asked him to give 0.5 units and stick with that for AT LEAST 3 days as the literature suggested.
He did not. He raised it on each and every subsequent dose because he kept getting high blood glucose numbers. But because they were not testing very often, they were MISSING the hypos--low numbers that the cat was dipping to that then catapulted him into HIGH numbers--to save his life from hypoglycemia. But the vet didn't test the glucose enough so missed this and assumed that the insulin wasn't working and kept jacking up the dose. On top of that they starved the kitty for the 12 hours between shots--ONLY Feeding at shot time. This also is wrong and ontributed to the hypos. Anyway, when I realized that they were doing everything all wrong--it's hard not to trust the vet even when you do know because they are the 'doctor' after all--I insisted on taking him homoe. They wouldn't let me do so without signing a waiver saying I was doing so 'against medical advice' Ha! The arrogance. One hour after I got the kitty home, the morning when the dose had been jacked up again to 2.5 units---from 0.5 units 3 days prior--I checked his blood sugar and he was 39--hypoglycemia and serious possibility of death. I was able to raise it up, etc. And now I have him on 0.5 dose, we are still figuring it out, but he's looking GREAT on this dose, his blood glucose numbers.
Anyway, that's just my little recent tale, I have others from Fred. Where the vets were wrong about how I should treat and/or medicate his kidney disease AND heart disease. And in all the instances I questioned it and then was able to do the right thing--one example was the doc prescribed 4 drugs for his newly diagnosed heart disease. The second day on the drugs Fred did not move for 10 hours--even though he'd been GREAT the entire week before on NO DRUGS. I took him off one of them--thevet got mad at me (but I researched--ON THE INTERNET--pulled up the vet medical journal articles myself and I have a PHDn in nutriton and phsyiology-- I can understand this stuff). I knew one of the other drugs was bad too, so after toing and froing--and feeling very bad as well about confronting my vet--I finally decided I had to stump up the money for another cat cardiologist opionin. And, as it turns out, that one agreed that Fred, at the time was 19 1/2 years old, none of these drugs were PROVEN to prevent anything- they were more standard protocol he said (what I'd read on my INTERNET RESEARCH!) And he agreed, this kitty is old,had multiple chronic conditions, he was fine OFF the drugs, let's just keep him on one--Plavix--to prevent blood clots. And that's what we did for 10 more months till he died.
But it was only because I challenged the vet that this occurred. I'm pretty certain that the drugs would have to Fred's demise much sooner. However, Fred's brother, ARtichoke, who died at 14 was not so lucky. I did not have the knowledge or research tendencies then and I look back and realize that there were many things I could have done that I didn't. But I just didn't know. Which is sad, but that is what it was.
So....I'm so sorry for you. I know how hard it is to be without your baby, and also to have wished it coudl have been a different way of dying.
You may not be ready, but this experience may be a catalyst for you to help other cats who are helpless--and there are plenty. You clearly have a ton of love to give, and the fact that you are here means that you are capable of going above and beyond to help some kitties that would others be ignored or even put to death. There is a huge need for foster and adopted homes for senior pets. Lots of subhuman people just dump them like they are trash once they get sick and old, and they often don't treat their disease eitehr. If you look at Pets On Death Row on Facebook, you'll see the kitties every night in New York city that are killed--I have fostered 5 of these kitties now this year--all of them adoptable and not worthy of being killed. The last of the 5 is the diabetic one.
So anyway, my thoughts & Prayers are with you. I'm so sorry. I'm afraid it's probably going to be sad for you for a long time. Maybe the only thing that could give you even a little relief is to help other kitties somehow.
best
Martica
