This all sounds so familiar.
My Dweezil was on Lantus for 3 years but it would be all over the place, even before we had a monitor and started trying to help him even more. He'd dip down low 16 hours after his shot sometimes and we couldn't maintain a stable routine.
He had 2 DKA incidents last year but thankfully survived. Both happened while we were away. The cattery is good and saved his life twice, as did our wonderful vet, but his insulin needs just seemed to increase hugely at the cattery (where previously 1.8 units would be ok or sometimes too much, 3 or even 4 units at the cattery would have little effect. Thus, the ketones developed as nobody knew this).
One thing of note. They CAN get ketones if they eat. Dweezil always ate and he still got ketones and then DKA rapidly.
In November last year we found some ketones at 1am but managed to treat at home with extra insulin and lots of water.
After his Lantus just started to often not work anymore early this year, we switched to Vetsulin (Caninsulin) in the hope that as a shorter acting insulin, it would eliminate the low & late low points of the Glargine.
It was definitely a gentler action than the Glargine, which surprised me actually, as I thought Vetsulin was a harsher insulin.
Unfortunately, by the time we were able to try the Vetsulin, Dweezil had been DKA 3 times in a week and the ketones just would not go away fully. They kept discharging him in 24 hours as his PH and other levels were ok, but his BG was never lower than the pinks. It was always a balancing act as he HATED being in the hospital or vet and would become SO highly stressed and extremely aggressive to the point nobody could get near his cage. He had his monitor on but to scan him they had to stick the scanner to a long pole just to try to get it close enough
So he SHOULD have been in hospital long enough for the IV rapid insulin to bring him down lower than pinks. They kept stopping it at pinks and then starting the normal Vetsulin shots. 1 unit. Not enough.
They kept saying he can't get ketones if he's eating. This is the specialist. He has before, I said, many times. If there isn't enough insulin, the body can't use the food so all the eating in the world won't stop the ketosis process from progressing.
One time Dwee was sent home from the specialist WITH mild ketones that by that night increased to moderate ones and he was not well. Would not eat much. Back yet again to our normal vet for intra-muscular insulin and fluids. He perked up nicely, but by the next day was flagging again already.
I believe if we had have been able to get RID of those ketones by the hospital getting his BG down lower, we could have then upped the Vetsulin from 1 (not enough but not hideously bad) to 1.5 (seemed to do NOTHING) to 2 units and he may have been able to be saved.
As it was, by then he had lost so much weight from being too high for too long, and his shots just simply did not seem to work many times, both the Glargine and the Vetsulin. We don't know why. Everything just seemed to stop working and whenever it didn't work, up his BG would immediately shoot and back the ketones would immediately come.
He is now...elsewhere and I am devastated. I am angry at the specialists and at Diabetes in general, and just want the light of my life back.
Please try with the Vetsulin. It may work well for your furbaby. Try hard to get rid of those ketones. You never want to see those, ever.
Good luck.
