new here, new to feline diabetes, starting insulin soon, hello!

Status
Not open for further replies.
Izzy2017

Izzy2017

Member Since 2017
Hi,
My cat, Izzy, is a 10 year old domestic short hair male, indoor/outdoor cat, diagnosed with diabetes 6 weeks ago. If I can figure out how to do a profile picture, I will get him on there, but for now just wanted to say hello, give a bit of history for anyone interested and also as a record for myself to look back on. At this point, Izzy is not on insulin yet, but his diet is canned food only now.
 
Izzy started losing weight in approximately November/December 2016. I treated him for tapeworms and roundworms (outdoor cat, eats mice/birds) , but he still kept losing weight, so finally took him to vet on 02/18/17 and his blood sugar was 530 (not fasting). We switched him over to canned cat food only (fancy feast) and went back to vet for a recheck on 03/03/17, his blood sugar was 399 (not fasting). Took him back to vet today and his blood sugar was 445 (fasting). His weight has stayed fairly steady, 13 pounds on 02/18, 12.8 on 03/03 and 12.8 today.
 
The vet wants to put him on Lantus 2 units twice a day. I ordered the insulin from Marks in Canada (very nice and helpful people there) and it should be here next week. I also ordered an AlphaTrak 2 glucose meter, this particular meter I ordered at the vet's request, it's what they use at their office and she wanted us to be using the same meter as they do (was very negative on my questioning using a human meter). She wants us to set up an appointment when we receive the insulin so she can teach us (daughter and I) how to give shots.
 
Last edited:
Vet didn't seem really adamant about checking blood sugar, but since I am uncomfortable giving insulin with no way to check for lows, I told her I would be buying one and she said that was great, just wanted me to use the Alphatrak 2. (as a side note, this vet has diabetes herself and also had a cat with diabetes that she treated for 5 or 6 years with insulin, she said)


I'm a little leery of starting out at 2 units twice a day (seems high) but am trying to have faith in my vet and do what I'm told. : )


So that's the long and short of our story. I've never had a diabetic cat or anything else diabetic before, so this is all new to me and I've been reading a lot here.

I did start an insulin spreadsheet and put it in my signature (if I did it right anyway), so now am just waiting on my supplies to arrive so I can get him started. Nervous, anxious, worried...but hoping with help from vet and this site, we can get Izzy feeling better.

Thanks for listening

Izzy's Mom

p.s. posted this in serial segments because I kept getting called spam:(
 
Welcome to you and Izzy. Sorry about the spam. We get so much of it here and the moderator is trying to cut down on it and I guess the software sometimes confuses members and spammers! Anyway, it sounds like you've been doing your homework! The 2 units is a higher starting dose. My vet wanted me to start there too, but I told him it worried me and he was fine with 1u so maybe talk to her about it. Since you will be home testing you will be able to keep Izzy safe. We have some great tips on how to test and if you have any difficulties, we can help you overcome them. Come over to the Main Health Forum to ask any questions you have.
 
Thank you--I will ask her if it's okay to start with 1u, I think I won't be as nervous giving that, then if he needs to go up we can always do that later.

I will definitely be looking at the testing tips...that's the part that is bothering me, giving the actual insulin I don't think will be too bad, but I don't want to do that poke for blood!

And thank you for the welcome : )

Sue
 
Welcome Sue!
The home testing is just a tiny drop of blood and the benefits you will see from the data will outweigh the poke :). Most kitties barely feel the poke because they have less nerves in their ears.
You'll find lots of help being on Lantus here, along with support for Izzy and YOU!
 
I was really nervous about doing self testing also. It's nerve racking at first, but it does get easier. One advantage of the meter your vet recommended is that it needs an extremely small amount of blood to test. My husband is diabetic, and his meter requires a lot more blood. So, your vet gave you a good recommendation.
 
Welcome! I'm glad you have a spreadsheet up and working already. We have lots of tips and tricks to help with testing and it gets easier the more you do it. :)
 
Thank you so much---your support is making me feel not quite so freaked out over the whole thing. I'm continuing to read the excellent information here on this site, which is extremely helpful. I'm glad to hear the meter the vet recommended is good!
 
Noticed a few days ago that Izzy was walking funny... yesterday he did not walk around at all. Today we have a vet appointment and we are going to increase insulin to 3 units and have bloodwork ran.. also going to ask about a b12 shot since I've seen others get it with good results.... will update on what the rest of the vet says later.. :(
 
Izzy2017 said:
Noticed a few days ago that Izzy was walking funny... yesterday he did not walk around at all. Today we have a vet appointment and we are going to increase insulin to 3 units and have bloodwork ran.. also going to ask about a b12 shot since I've seen others get it with good results.... will update on what the rest of the vet says later.. :(
Click to expand...
Actually for neuropathy vitamin b 12 methylcobalamin supplements are more effective than the shots.

Zobaline is a popular brand folks use, available on amazon
 
We decided to order b12 capsules that are 5mg. We still need to look at how much to start him at.

We had them run a fructosamine test after the vet originally said we should plan to start 3u 2x a day... his fructosamine came back at 291 which is within the normal range. So we are sticking to 2u 2x a day.

We are watching to see how he is walking still. He looks better than yesterday so we are watching and waiting a little.

Will attempt to do a curve this Saturday since it is the first day I don't have to work. ... :)
 
Glad to hear you're sticking with 2.0U for now. If you do decide to increase, we recommend increasing by small increments like 0.25U or 0.5U as jumping by whole units can jump over his ideal dose. Even though the ideal dose can change later ;).
 
Izzy2017 said:
We decided to order b12 capsules that are 5mg. We still need to look at how much to start him at.

We had them run a fructosamine test after the vet originally said we should plan to start 3u 2x a day... his fructosamine came back at 291 which is within the normal range. So we are sticking to 2u 2x a day.

We are watching to see how he is walking still. He looks better than yesterday so we are watching and waiting a little.

Will attempt to do a curve this Saturday since it is the first day I don't have to work. ... :)
Click to expand...
You can give the whole 5mg capsule, but maybe split it up to half in the morning and evening. B12 extra just gets peed out. They don't overdose on it.
 
Yong said:
Glad to hear you're sticking with 2.0U for now. If you do decide to increase, we recommend increasing by small increments like 0.25U or 0.5U as jumping by whole units can jump over his ideal dose. Even though the ideal dose can change later ;).
Click to expand...

We were going to go up .5u if she recommended that we increase. This wasn't our normal vet but we are supposed to get a call from the regular diabetes experienced vet tomorrow. :)
 
JanetNJ said:
You can give the whole 5mg capsule, but maybe split it up to half in the morning and evening. B12 extra just gets peed out. They don't overdose on it.
Click to expand...

Yes. Thankfully it is a water soluble vitamin so worse case is very expensive urine. :) Not sure if they can be split but we can definitely try!
 
Got the results from the vet...Fructosamine normal, Blood sugar high (we knew this), Borderline anemic (This is new) Other numbers all look good, including LFTs.

Weight 14 pounds, up from 12.8 pounds last visit. WOO!

The vet recommended that we increase from 2u 2x a day to 3u 2x a day. We mentioned to the vet that we thought it was a large jump and wanted to know if we could go to 2.5 instead of 3. She said that it would be too hard to read the little line... I hate to go against the vet's advice but nobody will be around during the day to monitor how he is doing.

His preshot is still in the mid to upper 400s. We are going to do a curve Saturday and Sunday but we do not have a chance to do this before hand. Does anyone have any pointers or what they would do in our situation? Thanks as always :)

EDIT: We shot at 2.5 instead of 3 just to be safe than sorry. We will probably end up going to 3 after a while but I hate to move his dose up while there is nobody to monitor him.
 
Last edited:
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top