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Hayley Mutton

Hayley Mutton

Member Since 2021
Hello,

So, my little Amber was diagnosed with Diabetes June 2021 - her insulin is Canusulin and we have been up and down with dosages but for the last 3 months the vet advised to give 1.5units twice a day. She has Royal Canin Diabetic cat food twice daily.

I did a curve yesterday as in the last 2 weeks, Amber has been drink soooo much and urinating more. She is constantly hungry, i did urine sample and the sugar in her urine was through the roof. The curves yesterday every reading was between 20 and 24 MMOL/l and the one at 4pm was 31.2MMOL/l - soooooo high :(

i have always test her Glucose Curves at home and they haven't been too bad, not great but ok, but yesterday every reading was ridiculously high.

I spoke to the vets this morning and he said to increase the insulin to 1.9 units twice daily for a week and then do another curve in a week.

I don't understand why all of a sudden she is like this any help would be appreciated,

Thanks
 
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Hi and welcome to the forum.
It’s great you are home testing.
Can you tell us if you are testing with a human meter or a pet meter please?
Are you testing before every dose of insulin?
It is also good to test during the cycle to see how low the dose is taking Amber. Testing around +2 to +6 with caninsulin will give you an idea of how low the dose it taking her.
Are you feeding the canned or dry food?
Ae you feeding and then waiting 30 minutes before the dose? Also it is good to feed a couple of snacks during the first half of all the cycles.

If you could set up a spreadsheet and a signature that would be very helpful
HELP US HELP YOU has the links to the spreadsheet, signature and hypo kit.

Here is the link to using Caninsulin https://felinediabetes.com/FDMB/threads/beginners-guide-to-caninsulin-vetsulin.231587/

We recommend going up in 1/4 unit increments so the next dose would be 1.75 units. I would not wait a week before testing the BG. I would test every day to keep Amber safe.
I will tag @FrostD as she has used Caninsulin
 
Thanks, i am testing with a ALPHA TRAK2 - pet meter. Testing before insulin and every 2 hours after.

6.00AM – 26.4 mmol/L
6.50 AM – Food X1 Wet Pouch – Royal Canin Diabetic
7.00 AM – Insulin 1.5 Units
8.00 AM - 15g Royal Canin dry Biscuits
9AM – 16.2 mmol/L
11AM – 13.8 mmol/L
1.00PM – 25.4 mmol/L
2.00PM – 24.1mmol/L
4.00PM – 31.2 mmol/L
5.00PM – 22.1 mmol/L
6.45PM – 23.2 mmol/L
6.45PM – Food X1 Wet Pouch – Royal Canin Diabetic
7.00 PM – Insulin 1.5 Units
8.00PM - 15g Royal Canin dry Biscuits
9.00PM – 23.7mmol/L


This is from yesterday
 
I would test at 6 am and then feed straight away, then wait 30 minutes then give the shot.
The Royal canin dry biscuits are high carbs……if it is the glycobalance dry food that is 23.5% carbs which is very high carb.
So I would get rid of that first and stick to the canned food.

Are you testing like this every day or just for the curve days?
We recommend you test every day before all the shots and then again during the cycles to see how low the dose takes your kitty. Just a test around +3 to +7 ( vary it) gives great data each cycle.

If you could get the SS and the signature set up and add your data that will help us a lot. If you have any trouble setting up the SS let us know and sometime will help you.

Before I increased the dose, I would get rid of the dry food and see if that helps….I’m sure it will. And give those extra snacks of low carb canned food in the first half of the cycles.
 
Agree - numbers are high enough to change and hold current dose, just be sure to test because sometimes the drop from diet along surprises us, they all react differently.

You will want to transition the food slowly to avoid tummy upset, over the course of a week or so. That said, I did cold turkey with my cat because he refused dry after having wet lol The effects of the diet change can take 1-2 weeks to really show through
 
So instead of giving the dry, perhaps give 1/2 a pack of the diabetic wet food around 8am, and then the same at bedtime - is that suitable?
 
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Hi--

My sweet kitty was named Amber too! :cat:

You are getting some great advice already, I just am popping in with a question about something that caught my eye:

Hayley Mutton said:
I spoke to the vets this morning and he said to increase the insulin to 1.9 units twice daily for a week and then do another curve in a week.
Click to expand...

That's a tough amount to measure consistently on insulin syringes-- are you by chance using U-100 syringes and a conversion chart?
 
So we have a few lists - the RC is on this one and 14% carbs. We aim to feed under 10%, most of us in the 4-7% range. Still keep your other foods for your hypo kit.

The UK specific foods are here.

There is no need to feed a prescription food, almost none of us do. But believe me, nearly all of us were sold on it originally!
 
Hayley Mutton said:
I don't understand why all of a sudden she is like this any help would be appreciated,
Click to expand...
Hi Hayley, waving from Surrey!

Regarding sudden higher numbers, sometimes this can be caused by 'too much' insulin as well as by 'too little'. This can happen if the blood glucose drops too low (or lower than the cat has become accustomed to) or too fast, and then triggers bouncing (rebound). The blood glucose can drop too low/fast for a number of reasons. Some examples... The dose can be too high. The cat may throw up their food (so the insulin is too much). The cat may just drop too fast on Caninsulin (it 'typically' does drop the blood glucose faster than most other insulins).
How is your kitty's health otherwise? Infections such as UTI can also raise blood glucose.

It would be great to see some more mid-cycle test data to see how fast the blood glucose is dropping and how low the blood glucose can drop at the peak of the cycle.

As said above, it is really important to test before every shot. It is this 'pre-shot' test that tells us whether the cat's blood glucose is high enough for insulin. Sometimes they can surprise us with a lower than expected number...
After that it's good to get some tests during the insulin cycle. It is the tests during the cycle that really show us how the insulin is working in the cat's body.

With Caninsulin the lowest number is 'often' around 4 - 4.5 hours after the insulin shot. But, 'every cat is different', and the peak of the cycle can be earlier or later than this (we've seen it as early as 3 hours after the shot and as late as 7 hours after). Testing will show you when your cat 'typically' has the lowest numbers of the cycle.
Even if you can only get one other test apart from the pre-shot test this can still give a lot of useful information. Some people who are out in the day aim to get a test in the evening.

The daily tests are actually more useful than the 'curves'. Curves do have their uses in showing us the 'pattern' of how a cat responds to insulin. But they have their limitations too in that they are just a snapshot of a particular day. And every day will be a bit different, sometimes a little, sometimes maybe a lot... Curves add to the data that we get from day to day testing, but they cannot reliably replace it.

Testing is particularly important if you are going to reduce the carb content of the diet. Please don't reduce the carb content of the diet unless/until you are able to do some tests on a daily basis.

You are doing really well! And Amber is a lucky girl to have you as her caring mum. :bighug:

Eliz
 
Hi Everyone, i have updated Amber's Spreadsheet - if anyone can offer any advice i would really appreciate it - Thank you :)
 
Oh wow she is very overdosed. I see you gave 1.9U, please keep a very close eye on her. If you have high carb food please set it out for her, but I would guess you might be in the late part of the cycle already.

All those lime greens you see are very dangerous especially on an AlphaTrak. They are hypo range. We do not want them below 90 on Caninsulin.

Please reduce your dose down to 1U. The high numbers you are seeing are her bouncing from being far too low.
 
Oh, oh I see ok. Hold this dose for now then I suppose...

Can you do me a favor and insert a blank row in between separated dates?
 
How's that - SS Updated, do you want to double check? So should i stay on 1.9? She is having one sachet of Royal Canin Diabetic Wet Food @ 6.30am and the same in the evening 6.30pm. She is also having about 8.00am 15g of Royal Canin Diabetic Biscuits and the same again at bedtime around 9.30pm? She is always hungry and most recently drinking so much and urinating the same :(
 
Perfect thank you! We're just so used to reading these, the line break is a quick visual cue they're separated.

Yes, hold the 1.9U. Do your best to get the preshot tests, and at least one additional test each cycle ideally between +2 and +6. I'm not sure if she's bouncing right now, so we'll look at the data the next 3 days and see.

How's her weight?
 
Hello, BG at 6pm (uk time) was 16.6mmol injected at 7pm 1.9 units. Will get another BG reading about 9pm

she has weighed 4.4kg for the last 4/5 months. This last week or so Amber is drinking loads and using the litter tray a lot more. I weighed her Saturday just gone and she was 4.1kg this morning I weighed and she was 4.2kg.

She is constantly hungry all the time. I don’t know whether it’s worth taking her to the Vets to do some bloods?

I did a urine ketone test and there was a Trace and Glucose was the highest it could be. She is a little more lethargic than usual and last night she slept at my husbands side of the bed, she never does that she’s always on my side. 4am this morning I called her and she came and snuggled up for a cuddle, which she doesn’t tend to do that early.

She’s my world and just want to make sure I’m doing everything I can for her, everyone’s help and advice is truly appreciated
 
Is the 4.4kg her ideal weight?

I know you said she eats the pouches, the info is a little hard for me to find in the states - about how many calories per day is she eating?

She is hungry (and losing weight) because her numbers are so high, it's very normal. I am asking about weight because as long as she is ideal or underweight, you can definitely feed her more, and definitely split it up into smaller meals. If she's overweight that's a little different story.

Can you share a picture of the strip you she'd, and the bottle it comes in? That sounds like a ruined glucose strip not ketones.
 
She’s fine on her weight about right definitely not over weight! Just sorting the images.

Will have to upload the images in the morning from my laptop thank you so much
 
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