Introduction - Ollie 13 year old female

[Carribou]

Hello!

I took Ollie in for boarding over memorial day weekend and brought her home with a diabetes diagnosis. I am currently waiting to go pick up her Lantus, and already have my One Touch testing device.

My vet has indicated that I should feed her only twice a day, only canned cat food (Fancy Feast Classic flavors). I should blood test her 20 minutes after she eats, and administer the insulin only if she is above 200. I have the spreadsheet ready to begin this evening once we have the insulin.

Thank you all for this fabulous resource and I am looking forward to sharing our trials, tribulations, and success stories with you all!

Michele & Ollie

 

[terri1962]

Michele,

Welcome and best of luck to you. I don`t think that feeding Ollie twice a day is enough though, that may cause problems with her BG levels but we will wait and see what some of the other members say.
The Fancy Feast Classic is a good food and a lot of people here feed that or Friskies Pate style foods whichever she will eat.

Terri

 

[Deb & Wink]

You should test first before feeding. You want to make sure the BG levels are high enough without any food influence before you shoot the insulin. The order with the Lantus and other longer lasting insulins is test, feed, shoot all in about a 10-15 minute timeframe. We usually recommend that beginners to home testing do not shoot insulin unless the pre-shot test is >200 mg/dL. It's nice to see your vet advised the same thing.

As you gain experience with your cat Ollie and how she reacts to insulin, you can gradually drop that shoot/no shoot threshold. Know thy cat.

We also find that more frequent meals over the course of the day helps to even out the BG (blood glucose) levels and takes some of the stress off the pancreas, giving it time to heal.

You do want your cat to eat when giving insulin, but if you can withhold food for 2 hours before the pre-shot tests, that is ideal. Since Lantus takes some time to onset or start working, you have some time to get Ollie to eat after the shot.

Lantus is a depot type insulin and it can take 5-7 days to see the full effects of the initial dose you are giving. That's because some of the insulin goes into storage and that storage of depot needs to 'fill up' before you see the full effects. You might want to go over to our Insulin Support Group forum for Lantus TR and read the Stickies at the top of the forum, especially the one on the depot.

What was the starting dose for Ollie? Cats rarely need more than 1U of the Lantus insulin to start.

 

[Carribou]

The vet started her at 1 unit. Looking around, I can see that the more common dose is .5 The vet was pretty concerned that Ollie was "on the verge of developing DKA" so I am not sure if that had something to do with the relatively high initial dosage. Ollie is quite thin, so I like the idea of leaving her food out. I will try to work out a system to get the food picked up 2 hours before her test/shot times.

 

[Tiger(GA) and Ruth]

Welcome and sorry that you need to be here but as a newbie myself, this is an amazing forum for feline diabetes. Good job getting your spreadsheet and good luck to you and Ollie.

I truly hope it isn't DKA, my Tiger had to be hospitalized for 4 days due to being on the verge of having DKA, we almost lost her. Have you found a suitable wet low carb food that Ollie likes? That was hard for us as she is a finicky eater, plus she didn't feel good at first and had a hard time gaining weight.

 

[BJM]

The vet started her at 1 unit. Looking around, I can see that the more common dose is .5 The vet was pretty concerned that Ollie was "on the verge of developing DKA" so I am not sure if that had something to do with the relatively high initial dosage. Ollie is quite thin, so I like the idea of leaving her food out. I will try to work out a system to get the food picked up 2 hours before her test/shot times.

A formula for the initial dose of Lantus is as follows:
Take the lower of the current or ideal weight ("lean weight")
Convert to Kilograms (pounds / 2.2)
Multiply by 0.25
Round down to the nearest quarter unit (we eyeball these on syringes; magnifiers help)

However, if she was showing signs of ketones, stick with the 1 unit and pick up some urine ketone/glucose testing strips (KetoDiaStix or generic). Also, take a look at my signature link on some tips for testing urine. Note: Urine testing strips only show you what has happened since the previous void.

Letting her graze will keep a nice even amount of food coming in, rather than a big bolus from meal feeding. Back when many vets were in training, the insulins available hit hard and fast, so you needed the food on board to match that. The newer insulins have a more gradual onset and longer duration, no longer requiring meal feeding.