Newbie - Oreo

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par4oreo

Member Since 2014
Hi. We have an 9 year old cat Oreo. Diagnosed January 2014 as being diabetic. Had taken him to the vet concerned with weight loss (08/13 he was almost 14 pounds and 01/14 he was a smidge over 7). Vet did do a urinalysis and blood work for initial diagnosis. Leukemia test came back negative. Initial glucose was 490ish. Started on Vetsillin at 2 units 2x daily - numbers never decreased even after giving up to 9 units 2x daily. Changed food from Kit and Kaboodle to dry Iams Glucose & Weight Control (up to 1/2cup 2 x daily) and canned Hill's Prescription M/D (1/2 can 2x daily). Was taking Oreo to the regular vet 2x weekly to be tested. Went to a 'specialist' last week of February - changed insulin to Lantus and started at 3 units 2x daily and we're now testing at home each evening. Number are not going down. Specialist wants us to increase units to 5. Very frustrated. We're on a fairly fixed income and this is blowing our budget. I've been reading the notes - are we okay to switch canned food from Hill's to something we can purchase at a local store? Any suggestions on dry food - meaning do we drop it completely? We were told it's okay to 'free-feed' until he puts on some weight but don't want to leave wet food out all day - dries out and gets smelly. Tonight's check was 453.

We call the specialist weekly with results - they mentioned tonight we may need to switch insulin again - 'N' type and 'R' type mixed - ever heard of this?

Thanks for all the posts - makes for interesting reading.
 
Welcome to FDMB.

NO on the R and N insulin - they don't last long enough in the cat.
You want PZI, ProZinc, Lantus, or Levemir.

Are you home testing? We strongly encourage it so you know exactly how your cat is doing, that it is safe to give insulin, and that the cat is not going to go too low.

The food you are giving may be part of the problem. We recommend low carb over the counter canned or raw food. Cat Info explains why and has an excellent food list you can print out for shopping. Anything under 10% calories from carbohydrates, such as Friskies pates, is fine. You must be home testing if you switch food in order to do it safely.

Add some water to the canned food to keep it from drying out - even freeze part to be nibbled as it thaws.
 
Hi and welcome to FDMB! One of my civvies is Oreo! :-D

Can we get your name too?

You're in the perfect place! We all love to pay it forward from our newbie days by helping others. BJ gave some great info. I can tell you mine get free fed wet food (friskies) and it's fine. Hasn't gotten really smelly. I add water since we've had some issues with UTIs and that helps. The remaining food is a bit dry when I take it up but it's not bad. You can also freeze some so it thaws as the day goes.

Let us know any questions you have! We'd love to help!
 
Hi to sugardude Oreo and welcome to the message board. Would you please share your caregivers first name with us?

we're now testing at home each evening.
Click to expand...
1.Which meter are you using for testing?

2. When do you test? You should be testing before food, before the shot.

3. How often do you test? You need tests during the mid-cycle, around +5 to +7 hours, to see how low the insulin shot is taking your cat. ECID which means every cat is different. Some cats nadir earlier, some cats nadir later. You need to test to find out when your cat nadirs so you know how low this dose is taking your cat.

4. When does your kitty Oreo nadir, or have his lowest BG (blood glucose) reading in a 12 hour cycle? Lantus dosing changes are based on this nadir or low or peak action, not the pre-shot tests.

5. Do you have any BG readings you can share with us?

I think your first action item needs to be to get some more tests and share them with us. For now, this format would work.
3/13 AMPS 453 3U +3 xxx PMPS xxx 3U +4 xxx +6 xxx
3/14 AMPS xxx 3U +4 xxx +6 xxx PMPS xxx 3U +5 xxx

AMPS = morning pre-shot test
U = number of units
+1 = 1 hour after the shot
+3 = 3 hours after the shot
+x = x hours after the shot
PMPS = evening pre-shot test

3 units is a lot of insulin, especially with Lantus since it's a depot insulin and it takes 3-5 days for the full effects of the dose to be seen. An increase from 3 units to 5 units is likely to overdose your cat and lead to hypoglycemia, coma and seizures. Please, we only increase in 0.25U increments, perhaps 0.5U depending on what the nadir was.

We use a modified version of the Roomp and Rand scientifically based, vet journal published protocol that is used for Lantus.

We call the specialist weekly with results - they mentioned tonight we may need to switch insulin again - 'N' type and 'R' type mixed - ever heard of this?
Click to expand...
Um, that's basically what the Vetsulin is, a mix of two different duration insulins. The 'R' type is very fast acting and the 'N' type is slower acting. The problem is, that it's the rare cat that gets a duration longer than 8 hours from these insulins. It's why we say only Lantus, Levimir Prozinc or PZI are best for cats, because they usually last 10-12 hours and have a much gentler action.
 
We are currently using an Alpha trax 2 testing meter.

We are only testing once a day - before evening meal. Results have been 03/08 - 428, 03/09 - 434, 03/11 - 558, 03/12 - 508, 03/13 - 453, 03/14 - 653 (disclaimer that he found a piece of waffle in son's room and ate it on that day). We have not gotten any test results since as Oreo has gotten very aggressive and tried to bite, shake his head and scratch...and I'm not getting enough blood to test. So very frustrating. We are going to watch some youtube videos after posting this to see if we can find an easier way to test him because what we've been told to do isn't working.

His water consumption has gone down in the last two weeks. Starting yesterday we have discontinued the dry food and started giving two cans (one at each feeding) of the Fancy Feast Classics. Good news there - he eats them right up.

Oreo is currently getting 3 units of Lantus -approx. 6am and 6pm

Thanks - Cindi
 
Vetsulin is:
Vetsulin® (porcine insulin zinc suspension) is a sterile, aqueous suspension of purified porcine insulin. Vetsulin contains 40 IU per mL, consisting of 35% amorphous and 65% crystalline zinc insulin. Vetsulin is a lente, or intermediate-acting, insulin.
http://www.vetsulin.com/vet/AboutVet_Ph ... etics.aspx
N (NPH) is
This is a suspension of crystalline zinc insulin combined with the positively charged polypeptide, protamine.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NPH_insulin
R insulin is
umulin® R U-100 is a polypeptide hormone structurally identical to human insulin synthesized through rDNA technology in a special non-disease-producing laboratory strain of Escherichia coli bacteria. Humulin R (insulin human recombinant) U-100 has the empirical formula C257H383N65O77S6 and a molecular weight of 5808.
http://www.rxlist.com/humulin-r-drug.htm

Thus, Vetsulin is a slow actin and thus should be better than a mixture of R and N (NPH) insulin.
 
Removing the dry food may drop his glucose about 100 mg/dL.

Checking around +5 to +7 hours after the shot may show you how low he is going. Some cats, when they go lower than their current normal or drop a large amount in a small amount of time, respond with counter regulatory hormones which release stored glucose (glycogen) and bump the glucose back up and higher for as much as 3 days before getting used to it. We call this bouncing.
 
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