Meet Benjamin

[Benjamin'sMom]

I came across this MB and am about to have my 17 y/0 Ben diagnosed and treated for what I suspect is most likely type I feline diabetes. Oddly, my husband has type 2, as does a number of his closest family members. It helps that I am a retired nurse and professional midwife and know more than I want about this disease, so I am torn about what the cost is going to be to have my good gentleman cat sized up and hopefully get him in remission if it's not too late. I have had many cats in my life but never one with diabetes and I cringe thinking of the suffering he's so slowly displayed to me. He's got every sign and symptom except obesity, quite the opposite, and even though we live in a high altitude, (CO) none of our pets have comsumed as much water each day as this boy does. My heart dropped this evening when I saw he used the Maltese's newspaper (Ben likes both litter pan AND newspaper) and it was nearly 85% saturated with urine. Our Maltese dog (Lambchop, a 6 1/2# girly-girl) tends to pee on the edges when she squats, so I can tell them apart. She usually pees much smaller quanities, but normal amounts throughout the day. Ben just goes and goes and goes, then drinks at least a full cup or more of water each day, and even sticks his head into my mug of water on the table if I am at a distance, many a morning the mug is knocked over, licks the facets, sticks his wet nose into anything he sees, ad nauseum.
Can anybody give me a ballpark figure how much the tests and meds will run me each month? I'll get some money tomorrow, thank goodness.
Do low cost spay and neuter clinics give a reduced rate for this treatment and all?
Is there a Canadian pharmacy that is low cost?
Do low carb/high protein diets really help?
Do naturapathic medicine work a little, a lot, or not at all?
I am scared for him and we live on a very restricted income. All we get is SS and my husband has some VA benefits and I'm on the state's health program, but have to pay co-pays and all my scripts and surgical bills. We lost our home of 23 yrs to foreclosure after my husband's first of 3 heart attacks, so life is really a challenge and all I possess is HOPE, thank God! I know I'll keep looking for work for some extra income, but I'm overlooked even though I went back to college and got another health degree by scholarship a year ago in hopes of working parttime because of my knee replacement 2 yrs ago and a couple other health issues!

Please reply or email me midwife00@aol.com with suggestions/solutions/tips. We love our kitter and people we know who say they don't like cats say Benjamin is way cool and loving. I wish you could meet the little guy. I dubbed him the Don Juan of Cats a long time ago because he overflows love and affection to everybody, even our precious pup :smile:

 

[Sue and Oliver (GA)]

Welcome Benjamin and Benjamin's Mom,

Luckily you have a number of things already working for you. If your husband uses insulin and it is Lantus or Levemir, both would work beautifully for your sugar baby. Since you both are probably familiar with checking blood sugar levels, we can tell you how to use the same materials human use to test Benjamin. (we use human meters and test their ears)

If he were mine, I would test his bg levels and immediately put him on a wet low carb diet. A vet explains why here: www.catinfo.org. Since money is an issue, you might try Friskies pates. They are the cheapest. Watch his levels and see if they go down just with the diet (normal levels are 40-120 without insulin). If he runs higher than that, you could try insulin (although we suggest not shooting under 200 when you first start out) so get advice on dosage first.

We'd be happy to guide you through this process, but we do it all on this forum or the insulin support group forums. This is a peer reviewed group so any dosage information is given on line.

Let us know how we can help.

 

[Lisa and Witn (GA)]

Sue has given you great advice.

The initial diagnosis is the most expensive part of caring for a diabetic cat. Ususally the diagnosis is confirmed with a fructosomine test at your vet.

Hometesting will save you a lot of money and also provide bettter care for Ben. You will know if it is safe to give insulin and also it will eliminate unnecessary trips to the vet for testing and curves. Many of us also feed our cats either Friskies or Fancy Feast canned foods. You will want to feed the pate flavors, they have less carbs than any foods with gravy. Dry food should be eliminated. If your vet tries to push prescription foods, tell them no thanks. Most of it is not good for diabetics and cats usually do not like it any way. If you have more than one cat, you will want to change all of their diets to a low carb canned food diet.

If your husband is not using Lantus or Levimer, you can have your vet write a script for the pens instead of a vial. On both companies website you will find links to their discount card that will keep the price to $25 for each pen. Depending on your dose, one pen should be enough insulin to last 2-3 months. The problem with vials is that the insulin becomes ineffective long before you will use it all. So you end up wasting a lot of money. One package of pens could give you enough insulin to last almost a year and you will be able to use almost every drop.

Caring for a diabetic cat is not difficult. It just takes some effort to develop a routine that works for you. But we can help you with that.

 

[BJM]

As you know, diabetic ketoacidosis is a risk for uncontrolled diabetes. Check my signature link Secondary Monitoring tools for some ways to collect a fresh urine specimen to test for these, plus some other, indirect assessments you can make to evaluate condition.

We suggest using an inexpensive human glucometer with pet-specific reference numbers. One many of us use is the WalMart Relion Confirm, or Confirm Micro, which is also sold at American Diabetes Wholesale as as the Arkray USA Glucocard 01 or 01 Mini (same manufacturer - Arkray USA). It uses a tiny blood droplet and the cost is significantly lower for test strips (like $0.36 each).

Comparing a human glucometer to a pet-specific glucometer is like reading temperature in Celsius vs Fahrenheit. Both are correct. You just need to know the reference ranges to interpret what the numbers mean.

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

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *​

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.)

 

[Benjamin'sMom]

Thanks for the advice!....I am going to see the vet for our dog's next rabie's shot in a week, but am proactive and looking into pet insurance and seeing if I can get them both a good deal for healthcare (thank God there's no Obamacare for animals required!!!!!

I plan to shop tomorrow for the cat food, more litter, and grapple with maybe putting a website up for medical donations and see if that and the vet would be willing to help us with dosing with the Lantus if she agrees it's ok. Gotta get husband to allow me to use his glucometer and test strips until I can afford one just for Ben.

Please....thank you once again and I'll stay in touch so I can handle the day to day management of his diabetes. It's got to be easier than dealing with my husbands health issues. Also, I would like the vet to make sure Ben doesn't have any additional health problems being masked by the obvious diabetic symptoms. What an incidious disease this is!!!! :YMSIGH:

Benjamin'sMom Lynda

 

[BJM]

The estimated dose for starting Lantus in a cat is as follows:
Get the ideal weight for the cat.
Get the current weight for the cat.
Take the lower weight of these; this is the lean weight.
Put into kilograms if in pounds (divide by 2.2)]multiply by 0.25
Round down to nearest 0.5 units (we eyeball these).

Shoot on as close to a 12 hour schedule as possible. 15-30 minutes difference in the day is about the most you every want to shift the time.
You must keep the same dose for 5 days before you determine if the 1st dose needs to be increased; 3 days once past the first dose.
This is because it lasts more than 12 hours in the cat and the overlap builds up gradually. This overlap is called the depot or shed.

Test before feeding, after 2 hours without food ('sort of a fasting' glucose for a cat), for safety.
The glucose level usually hits its lowest about 5-7 hours after a shot, so that's when you check to see how low it went.

A note on pet insurance: there usually is a waiting period to rule out people getting it knowing the pet has a medical problem.

 

[Chris & China (GA)]

Lynda, welcome to you and your sugarcat Benjamin!!

It's fine to use your husbands glucometer if you like, but you'll be needing to test Benjamin at least 4 times a day so you might want to consider getting a Relion meter from WalMart. They're only about $15, and the most important part, the refill strips, are affordable! It's not the meter's that kill the budget, it's the strips!

The Relion Confirm and Micro use the tiniest blood sample, but their strips are a little higher at about $19 for 50

The Relion Prime using a little bigger sample (but still not very much) and the strips are $9 for 50

I totally agree that you should try getting him onto the low carb wet food first, and see what that does for his levels before worrying about insulin. I gave China 2 weeks before going to Lantus.

Good luck to you, and you CAN do this! We all come here scared, confused and worried, so you're in very good company!!

Just a little housekeeping note....We use the 911 icon only when our cats are in a medical emergency, so would you mind taking it down? You can use the ? instead if you have more questions. You have to remove it from the first post, and if you put the ? up, it also has to be in the first post....that way people skimming the board can see that you have a question (or in the case of the 911, a medical emergency)