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Joel Culliford

Member Since 2023
Hello

My name is Joel and I have a 13 yr old grey Tabby, named George. He has been a diabetic cat now for a year and a half and asthmatic for about a year. He gets a puffer twice a day and 7 units of insulin twice a day. Still can't get his numbers down. The usual low if lucky is 15 and the high is usually around 30.
 
Hi Joel , I agree with jayla 7 units like an awful lot of insulin
Here is a link helping us to help you link. If you noticed, our members have some basic information about their cat's in their signature. This helps us to not pester you by asking the same questions (your cat's name, insulin type, date of diagnosis, etc.) repeatedly. We also have a link to our spreadsheet in our signature. We are very numbers driven. The spreadsheet is a record of your cat's progress. By linking it in your signature, we can follow along and provide feedback should you need the help.
The link I gave you will also explain how to set up your spreadsheet and how it works
 
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Hi and welcome Joel and George to the forum.
7 units is a lot of insulin to give a kitty. Can you tell me how you arrived at 7 units please.?
What type of insulin are you using?
What dose of insulin did you start out with.?
What type of food are you feeding?
How often do you feed your kitty?
Does George have any other illnesses/diseases?
Does George get any medications apart from the puffer?
How do you test the blood glucose? Are you doing it yourself or do you go to the vet every so often?

We can definitely help you...we just need some information first.:)
 
Hello

I will do my best to figure all this out

7 units is a lot of insulin to give a kitty. Can you tell me how you arrived at 7 units please.? Our vet started him at 1/2 a unit and he his numbers were not getting better and slowly over the last year and a half we have been increasing per vet's orders.
What type of insulin are you using? ProZinc (hopefully spelt it right)
What dose of insulin did you start out with.? Lantus (Hopefully spelt it right)
What type of food are you feeding? PURINA® PRO PLAN VETERINARY DIETS® WET FOOD Diabetic...3 cans a day.
How often do you feed your kitty? 8am feeding with needle, snack in the afternoon (part of a can), Feeding at 8pm with needle and a snack before bed (part of a can)
Does George have any other illnesses/diseases? There has been a lot of tests, he is asthmatic and I think he slight swelling in the spleen but the vet said that was not an issue.
Does George get any medications apart from the puffer? no
How do you test the blood glucose? Are you doing it yourself or do you go to the vet every so often? We use to do it ourselves with a free style libre but that got expensive. He hates getting his glucose checked but we try every so often to do a curve. The vet does it every 6 months. I do have a lot of free style libre info from when we did use those but I don't know how to post that.
 
I think Purina pro plan is a high carb food. Too high for a diabetic cat. Diabetic cats need to be feed a low carb diet of 10% or less

FOOD CHART have a look on this chart. You want foods that are under 10%. unfortunately, the food recommended by vets most of the time is actually bad for diabetic cats. It keeps their sugar high and the insulin doses too.

This is an excellent site for diabetic cats…it has been around for more than 25 years and has very experienced people to help you!
 
What Ale said is just what I was thinking:cat:
Most vets do not know very much about treating FD and they put you on a too high carb food :confused: and usually insulin designed for a dog (vetsulin) your on a good insulin for cats , Lantus and Levemir are good too.
If you switch to a low carb food you need to home test because his numbers will likely come down and possibly quickly. Do you have a hypo tool box in case he drops too low?
Keep asking questions as @Ale & Minnie (GA) said there is a lot of knowledge in this forum from people who have hands on experience..she also provided the link to the food chart above .
Also his BG is much higher being tested at the vet due to stress you will have a more accurate reading testing at home.
 
Would you be willing to try home testing the blood glucose?
Just testing every 6 months is fraught with danger. Blood glucose (BG) levels change several times a day and testing just every 6 months will give you absolutely no idea what is happening. If George was bouncing on the day he was being tested at the vet, or was stressed at the vet which would leave his BGs to be higher than normal, that would give a totally incorrect and possibly dangerous view of what is actually happening. An increase in dose could be advised when in fact a decrease could be what is needed.
Is that the food you amaretto feeding…if so it is low carb. But if you would like a less expensive but still very suitable food have a look at the food chart posted in an earlier post above.
https://www.purina.com.au/brands/pr...dm-dietetic-management-feline-formulas-canned

if you think you may need help with the spreadsheet I can get someone to help you easily. Just ask.
Does George seem satisfied with the amount of food thou are feeding him? Does he ask foe more? I’m glad you are giving him a snack during each cycle.
 
Welcome to FDMB!

Just so everyone is on the same page, Purina Pro Plan Diabetic food is Purina DM. It is 6% carb.

You've been doing a great job with managing your George's diabetes. It sounds like your vet prescribed appropriate insulin (i.e., either Lantus or Prozinc) and didn't start your cat out on too high of a dose. Likewise, if I've got the food correct, you've been feeding your cat a low carb diet.

I would definitely encourage you to get more tests than every so often. The problem with very intermittent testing is that you don't know if you've missed lower numbers. You also have no idea whether numbers are sufficiently low that it's not safe to give insulin. We encourage testing at least 4 times a day -- test at each preshot time and at least once during each of the two daily cycles. Once we can see what the pattern of your cat's numbers look like, we may have some additional ideas to help get your cat on track.
 
Hi and welcome!!

this is great place to be when you have a diabetic cat, there is a lot of experience and the best of the people to help you but they need your help to help sort of speak and the one thing they need is information, the information you have from when he used the free style libre can be helpful to see what was going on back then but to be honest you will need information on how he's doing now to really help him and the best way to to it will be by home testing, using a manual blood glucose meter ( human one is just fine and test strips are a lot cheaper) is not as hard as it seems all you need is a bit of practice and for both of you to get used to it and it will make a world of difference on how you handle his insulin, first of all you will be sure is safe to give insulin without the risk of causing his blood glucose to go to low and you will be able to adjust his dose to what he needs, either lower it or maybe raise it if your cat does need a lot of it ( it is rare but it does happen)
 
Joel Culliford said:
For half a year or longer we did the freestyle libre monitor on his back and took regular readings. I hope this link will work.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1-eM1t0vT-WqrNRjkwEXo_g_moDywV45e/view?usp=sharing

The only reason we stopped was because of the cost.
Click to expand...
Thanks for posting the information. It is very hard to read as we use a different way of monitoring.
It does appear that most of the reading were very high.
Would you be interested in trying home testing George? It is really the only way to find out how things are going. While the libre is fine to use, it is very expensive to do long term.
We can help you with it.
I am very concerned he is on 7 units prozinc twice a day with no monitoring.
Do you have a hypo kit set up in case he has a hypo?
 
Thanks for the information, it seems he was mostly on high values and not really regulated, but this are values from more than a year ago, to help him you will need to have values on how he's doing right now every day before shooting him to keep him safe and mid day at least to know how he's doing during the day and a curve once a week will probably help a lot.

To do that you do not need to get a new freestyle libre you can home test with a human blood glucose meter, most of us do it that way is not so hard once you get some practice it is not so expensive, certainly cheaper than the freestyle libre , and most importantly absolutely indispensable if you are giving insulin, to give insulin without knowing what his blood glucose level is is very dangerous he could go hypo
 
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