Welcome to the FDMB Amaris and sugarcat Rico!
Successful treatment of diabetes has three main steps.
The first is diet.
A diabetic cat needs to be eating a low carb canned or raw diet. You don't need any special "prescription" foods either! There's nothing magic about them that treats diabetes. Many of them are too high in carbs (especially the dry ones!), and the ingredients tend to be low quality, too! Most of us feed our own cats Fancy Feast Classics, Friskies pates or 9-Lives ground because they get less than 10% of their calories from carbs. They are also easy to find and affordable. Changing to a low carb canned or raw diet can be enough for some lucky cats to become regulated! If there are no ketones in the picture, it's a good place to start!
Next is insulin. There are some insulins that are much better than others in cats. Lantus, Basaglar, Levemir and ProZinc are the gentlest and most successful at getting them regulated and even possibly into remission! They are pricey, but we know the best places to buy them.
A lot of vets are still using Vetsulin because it's what they're used to but it's really a better insulin for dogs. In cats, it tends to hit hard and fast and then wear off before the next shot is due. Vets see more diabetic dogs than cats and tend to try to treat their feline patients like small dogs and it just doesn't usually work very well.
Last, and not least, is home testing. Many vets don't even discuss this with their clients, for varying reasons, but if you had a diabetic child, you would test their blood sugar before every shot, and we should do the same for our furkids.
Also, testing done at the vet's office can be unreliable due to stress, which can significantly raise the BG. By testing at home, you get more accurate results.
Most of us use a human meter from your local pharmacy because it's accurate and affordable to use. A favorite here in the US is the Relion Prime from WalMart. The meter is only $9 and the strips are $17.88 for 100. Testing before every shot, you make sure it's safe to give insulin at all. By testing in between shots, you learn how the blood sugars are responding to treatment.
There are "pet" meters, but the strips for them are about $1.00 EACH which is too much for most of us when we test at least 4 times a day (more if they're running low or dropping fast)
Your vet has increased Rico's dose too much, too quickly. Going from 1U to 2U doesn't sound like much, but it's still a 100% increase in the dose! That's like a human going from 30U to 60U!
If Rico were my cat, I'd stick with the 1U dose and learn to home test so you can get a better idea of what his glucose numbers are like when he's at home and relaxed.
We have a special spreadsheet we all use that really helps us see what's going on and allows us to give you the best advice possible. Here are the
Instructions on getting the FDMB spreadsheet If you have any problems, feel free to ask!
Hang in there. We've all been where you are and understand how overwhelming and scary this can be! But we all did it and so can you!!
I wouldnt pull back the plunger while the needle is still under the skin. You probably just got a drop of blood doing that. (just my guess) For home testing I would read here first then come back and ask questions:
