Low numbers

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Nancy C

Member Since 2013
Tested Gus last night at 7:36 and he was at 127 so i didn't shoot. He ate during the night. Tested him at 6:18 he was at 85. Tested again 20 minutes later and he was at 92. I'm not going to shoot because I feel I would put him in danger plus he didn't eat his breakfast. Ill be home from work around 5:30. And will test then and will see if he ate anything. He had a little bit if loose stool yesterday and I think he is still stressed from his whole ordeal last week. Any advice?
 
That is a lovely number, Nancy, especially for 24 hours since the last shot. That he is coming down on his own, without insulin, is great and may mean his pancreas has started to work on his own. You are exactly right not to give insulin.

How was he diagnosed? Did he have a fructosamine test or was the diagnosis based on the blood glucose level in the vet's office? I am asking because I am wondering if he was really diabetic.

Regardless, good numbers. Post when you get a number tonight and we can see what's up.
 
I think it was just the in house bg test. But they did do a full CBC. I'm baffled by this!! They said he had numbers up over 600 in the hospital. I'm sooo glad to hear that's a good number. He wasnt in the mood to eat but I think he was just still agitated from all the vet activity. I will post when I get home re: his numbers. Is it possible to just have high blood sugar from something he was eating? He had a treat addiction. Ill speak to you later. Happy to know I don't need to worry while st work.
 
Sometimes the cat is really stressed out at the vet and stress raises bg levels. But 600 is a very high number, even for the vet. No infections,right? That could also raise the levels. The other possibility is that sometimes a hypo will throw a kitty into lower numbers overall. And yes, the right food and snacks can definitely lower the numbers, but usually in the 100 point range.

Maybe a combination of the hypo and the food. Who knows? But I like today's numbers. It is possible that he will be high tonight; 48 hours without insulin. But we will definitely suggest lowering the dose.
 
Sue...thank you for so much help. He seemed fine and almost normal. I'm glad to hear that's a good number. Now I can not be totally stressed at work thinking about him. He did have bilateral perinephric pseudo cysts which he had repaired in November so I wonder if this kidney thing has any effect on his numbers. Like I said I'll be home to test around 5:30-6 tonight.
 
Hey there

remind me what he is being fed? wet/dry? type? Did you change the food on diagnosis?

Also can you fix the link in your signature to remove the "old" after the html at the end? The "old" means the link doesnt work properly.

Wendy
 
Hey. Feeding wet proplan And fancy feast. No change in food because he's underweight about 2 lbs
 
He likes the gravy ones. I bought some of the pâté type and minced. I'm hoping he will like at least one of them but not so far. I also have some evo food and wellness. As well as a bunch of fancy feast and friskier we are going to try
 
Also I'm testing with a reli on plus meter from Walmart. Should I be adding or subtracting numbers to the number I'm getting? Or is the number that comes up his bg number?
 
You can trust the numbers you are getting from the relion.

Keep the gravy ones for any hypo issues in your hypo kit emergencies only. To control his BG and for possible remission, pates are better - see list in my link above. Fancy feast classic pates and friskies pates and wellness grain free are all good. So are the Evos.

What minced? Wellness?

Wendy
 
Hi Nancy,

Would you please add one more thing to your user control panel, edit profile, location field and submit to save. Something as general as the country and state/province you are in will be really helpful. You can see my location in my post over on the right hand side, below my user name and avatar picture.

Since we all live in different time zones, it is helpful to know someone's general location when helping them. I'm on the east coast of the US. If someone in California or Australia or the UK posts, I may be off to work or off to sleep. I like to know where people live to determine if I will be around and awake for hypos, testing situations and such.

Thank you.
 
Not sure of the minced....ill check later. As far as the gravy ones, Gus is really picky so I'm happy to see him eat.
 
You might see if you can "fool" him. Try mixing some of the pate styles with warm water and making a gravy. Sometimes it is the texture as much as the taste. Another idea is to mix the two - gravy and pate - adding more pate and less gravy as you wean him off.
 
There was a member on here feeding her cat the canned 'shred' style cat food. She would mix a tiny bit of the pate into the shreds. Make sure her cat would eat that for a few days. Mix a tiny bit more pate in, a little less shreds. Sometimes, she would have to go back to a previous combination of the two foods to get her cat to eat.

It took a while, but eventually her cat did transition and eat only the pate style food. This was member Jamie & Jupiter. It took a full month to work through this food change.

There are also some good tips and tricks here to get a cat to eat a different food type. It was written for transitioning a cat from dry to wet food but the same tips and tricks work for a change from shreds to pate style or chunky to pate. http://www.catinfo.org/docs/TipsForTransitioning1-14-11.pdf The idea is to make the pate style more tempting, more appealing for your cat then the other gravy style.

There are also some of the Fancy Feast non-pate styles that are low carb. Try the Tender, Chunky, Flaked, Kitten varieties.

Do you free feed or meal feed? Yes, it is important that your cat eats, but they need to be hungry to want to eat something unfamiliar.

Some tricks that I used with my foster cat Wink are: heat up the food to mouse body temperature, sprinkle parmesan cheese on the food, pour a little tuna water over the food, crumble a freeze dried chicken treat like the Halo Liv-a-little treats or the Pure Bites on the food, switch to meal feeding, put dish down for 20 minutes and then remove. Try the food again in a couple of hours.

If free feeding now, maybe try to get him on a meal feeding schedule first, then try for lower carb food. Let his natural hunger work for you in this process.
 
Just tested at 105. Has had no shot since yesterday around 8:30. He ate a little bit. Had a little diarrhea today. Drinking water ok. Please advise. I will test him again in a half hour and to make sure he keeps all his food down.
 
Are you updating his spreadsheet?

105 is good. Normal cat levels is 40-130. Maybe he will be able to be solely diet controlled if you tweak his foods as suggested to low carb wet.

Is he still not eating properly?

Wendy
 
Like I said he had diarrhea but he ate some. I had to run out so I will see if he's kept it down. There wasnt much eaten but he was only wolfing his food down when the diabetes was diagnosed. Is it possibly something else and not diabetes? I'm so frustrated. Or is he still riding on the high insulin shots from last week? I don't care about the money but if I stressed him out for a whole week and it wasn't needed ill be mad. If he has diabetes shouldn't his numbers have been over 200 today with no shots? Arrrrggghhhh!!!!
 
hmm I am wondering...- remind me what the vet said about the fructosamine test - did he do one?

Whats the highest reading he has had at home?

have you changed anything (food?) since the diagnosis?

Wendy
 
They did not mention a fructosamine test. I know he had a CBC. And a t4 for hyperthyroidism. The bg didn't even register in the office and he had syrupy pee. I forgot to ask if he had a fructosamine test. I'm assuming so but I will call in the morning. I haven't changed one but of his food except that I have stopped giving him an abundance of cookies (like greenies or temptations) I checked in every day when he was at the vet and they told me he had numbers in the 300s and 400s. Here are the symptoms he had. Extreme thirst and peeing. He was always very hungry. Meowing at night for water. He was on lasix since his surgery in November for bilateral perinephric pseudo cysts. I expected his numbers to be at least 200-250 when I got home. I will not give him a shot tonight because I think that would be insane.
 
He is regulating himself without insulin. You want him between 40-120 for the next two weeks and then we have an OTJ party.

Why? I don't know. Maybe he was never diabetic, a misdiagnosis. The symptoms did sound like diabetics - peeing alot, hungry, thirsty. High carb snacks might have moved up the numbers a little. (Temptations are high carb)
 
I will not give him a shot tonight because I think that would be insane.
Click to expand...
Good call. We would advise not giving any insulin also.

You can replace those high carb treats with something that is pure protein like bonito flakes or freeze dried chicken. Here is a list of treats that are low carb: http://felinediabetes.com/FDMB/viewtopic.php?f=14&t=9172

List of Low carb healthy treats

Postby squeem3 » Sun Mar 14, 2010 5:34 pm

Real Food Toppers
Halo Liv-A-Littles
WildSide Salmon
Whole Life
Catswell

OnlyNaturalPet.com All Meat Bites
OnlyNaturalPet.com Freeze Dried Turkey Liver
OnlyNaturalPet.com Poultry Crispies

Bravo Pet dry roasted and freeze dried treats
Beefeaters freeze dried treats
Pure Bites
Cat-Man-Doo bonito flakes - Other brands are available in pet stores. Tip: If your cat loves bonito flakes, buy a large bag of it at an Asian supermarket. Asians use the bonito (tuna) flakes to make soup, particularily Japanese miso soup. A huge bag will only cost a few dollars and will last a long time. Be sure to check the ingredient label on the bag to make sure that only bonito flakes are listed with no other ingredient such as a preservative or salt.
Drs. Foster and Smith Liver Bites
Drs. Foster and Smith Chicken Bites
Drs. Foster and Smith Seafood Treats

Grain free freeze dried raw food such as Nature's Variety and Stella and Chewy's (new cat line coming in May. The dog ones can be fed to cats as treats)

Other low carb treats:
http://www.felinediabetes.com/low-carb-cat-treats.htm
http://www.felinediabetes.com/homemade-treats.htm
viewtopic.php?f=3&t=445

Anything that is 100% meat with nothing else is best. There are many brands you can feed. Check the dog treat aisle for meat treats. Some
 
I don't mean to complain because I'm fine with him regulating himself but mind... He was diagnosed last Saturday may 11th. He spent from Monday to Friday at hospital getting shots of prozinc as high as 4 units. I brought him home Friday night. Have him food and his shot and then again in the am. By 1pm he was hypo and being rushed back to hospital where he spent overnight with glucose iv drip. They said they gave him 2 units on Sunday morning and that was the last shot (Saturday afternoon his bg was 18 in the office). But how can he be otj if he's not really on it? I've spent a lot of money over the past week. And the doc told me I didn't need to test at home but I have been. What if I was just giving him the shots like I was told? I could've killed Gus!!! I'm so upset over this whole thing. What do I do take him to another vet for a second opinion? Demand another fructosamine test...if it was ever even done? I'm just really mad and frustrated and sick that I could've hurt my baby. cat(2)_steam
 
What you do is continue to monitor the numbers. At least one test in the AM and one test in the PM, roughly 12 hours apart.

Since Gus is not getting any insulin, he can not hypo. Breath a big sigh of relief there.

This could be a temporary blip. Better to continue to monitor and see what the BG numbers do.

The pancreas could be 'sputtering' cranking out some insulin as it heals. It takes time to heal the pancreas.

People and dogs can not heal the pancreas and get the cells to start producing some insulin. Cats are lucky. Their pancreas can sometimes be healed, sometimes completely healed.
 
Complain away - to your vet!! I am wondering too if he ever was diabetic but there is no way to know now since his BGs are within normal range - might be to late to do another fructosamine since its just an average of BG over the last few weeks and has been normal now for a few days so it might not show anything

Maybe it was an infection that passed? or Maybe you lucked out just on the food choices - maybe you started feeding low carb flavours of the proplan and fancy feast without realizing?

1. What flavours of proplan and fancy feast have you been feeding recently?
2. Did he ever get dry in the past?
 
The other part of this puzzle is that he did hypo, right? Some cats have a hypo and never use insulin again. Not often but it does happen. I don't know whether it's a shock that wakes up their pancreas or something else.

I think it would be fair to talk to your vet. You have had a rocky road with a hypo, too much insulin and now non diabetic numbers. Maybe you can help his next diabetic patient by showing him how testing has saved Gus' life, literally.
 
Gus eats the most gravy flavors possible. The turkey veggies and gravy tomatoe beef and carrots and rice. Anything gravy. He used to just eat pro plan dry but then I read they needed moist food so he would free feed dry all day and can of wet at night. Then in the past couple of years he's been free feed dry and a can of wet am/pm. I am totally overwhelmed and I'm glad he's not going to be hypo because I never want to see that again. I mentioned he was on lasix and this was 12.5 mg every other day. I'm
Wondering if this can contribute. He hasn't been on it in over a week. I'm going to call his surgeon tomorrow. I will continue to test 2x a day just to see but holding off on insulin. So glad I decided to get the bg meter or god knows where Gus would be
 
I'm going to continue to test and let the doctor know what's going on. I'm also calling the surgeon to see if the lasix could have had anything to do with this. I've got to calm myself down before I call his doctor to find out his numbers and test results. Ill keep everyone posted on his numbers
 
Just don't lose sight of the fact that this is all pretty great news! He's not getting insulin shots. He's healthy and happy. Remember to breathe deeply and often. :mrgreen:
 
He has dry to nibble but hasn't really. I am thankful that I don't have to give him insulin. He's been through sooooo much. I just hope this isn't a fluke
 
Ok so would you say he hasn't been eating as much kibble since diagnosis? That could make all the difference. Take it away entirely.
 
I'm going to get rid of the dry food. Is there a low carb kibble that he may like? He's still not eating much but I feel like he's traumatized from last week. I will test in am and post with new post. I'm going to try some of the fancy feasts on him. Has this happened before on here?! I'm baffled!!
 
Not often. We have seen cats being misdiagnosed recently but in your case I am not sure that's the case.

There is a low carb dry called young again zero carb or you could try the innova EVO cat and kitten or wellness core grain free.
 
Today he was a bs of 98 at 6:30am. Doesn't seem
That hungry and still a little loose in his stool. Could this be stress?
 
Stress from what?

How much is he eating exactly? How many what size cans? Want to know if his eating is just less because his blood is good or if he isn't eating enough.

I am also wondering if something else is going on.
 
Stress from being in the hospital all last week. He's eating maybe a third of a fancy feast can. I realize he was sick but he was eating up to 3 cams a day and grazing on dry kibble. Calling doctor today
 
Seems unlikely he would still be stressed. U need to get him eating more 1/3 can of fancy feast a day isn't nearly enough. Give him kibble or whatever he will eat for now.
 
A general check up might be a good idea. It is so hard to tell whether it is diabetes or diabetes and something else or something else. Does he generally seem to feel good? Peeing, pooping normally? Playing and grooming, alert? Clearly his appetite is off. Has he lost weight?
 
He seems pretty normal. Haven't tested for ketones but would he have them if bs is testing normal? I'm going to see if he eats what I left at home otherwise I may have to inquire about appetite stimulant. Like I said he was eating like a horse until he came home from the hospital. I haven't smelled anything abnormal with his breath.
 
Probably not but then he isn't eating. I am very concerned about how little he is eating. Here are some tips to get him to eat but I also strongly suggest asking the vet too tomorrow for his advice...

Cheryl & Winnie wrote:
Enticing a Cat to Eat

Here are some things you can do do entice your cat to eat:

-sometimes in order to get a cat to eat you even have to resort to dry it is more important that they eat. there are a couple low carb / grain free brands -- EVO and wellness core.

-making a buffet to give him choices
- heating food

sprinkle food with :
FortiFlora -- a probiotic you can get at vets or online. is very smelly and cats love the taste of it.
parmesean cheese
smashed crumbles of dry food
bonito/tuna flakes (Can be found at Asian markets or sometimes in the Asian food section of a large grocery store.)
halo chicken treats (freeze dried chicken) -- crumble into dust over food -- my Wolfie loves this stuff.
pour a little water from tuna in water over food (I use low sodium/no sodium added as other kinds in water has veg. broth in it and I assume that means onions, which are toxic to cats and it shouldn't contain soy -- check labels)
powdered oregano. yep sounds weird . but some cats like it and it will entice them to eat.

other ideas of foods to offer your kitty to stim appy:
trader joe tuna for cats
baby food -- beechnut or Gerber Stage 2 -- you want a baby food that is only a protein + broth (although the Gerber contains cornstarch). It should have no onions or other additives. some babyfoods have onions . please read labels if you can't find beechnut.
kentucky fried chicken
deli turkey /chicken
plain cooked ( boiled or baked ) chicken breast
canned chicken for people (watch the label that their are no onions)
chicken broth -- low sodium

If enticements don't work, you should consider:
-assist feeding ( syringe or make little meatballs and place in mouth)
-and/or talking to your vet about appetite stimulents ( mirtazapine or cyproheptidine)
Click to expand...
 
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