Newly Diagnosed- Looking to buy a meter.. which is good?

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Vhens2211

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Hi all,

My 9 year old Ocicat Ozzie was just diagnosed last weekend with diabetes. We started him on Insulin Monday night.

I heard that it is best to do daily testing at home with a meter. I'm a little overwhelmed by everything so I'm not sure what meter is best to get and the easiest to use? I heard there's one at walmart that works good?

Thanks!
Vivian and Ozzie.
 
The Relion Confirm or Micro are both good. they are Walmart's house brand. they are the most economical as far as store bought meters go. they are comparable to the Freestyle line of meters in my opinion in that they require no coding and require the smallest blood sample.

other meters that are good are the Freestyle meters, the Contour, the One Touch meters, and even the Accu-chek Aviva. Problem with these meters is the price of the test strips. At the store you'll easily pay $1 or more per strip for the name brand meters whereas for the Relion I want to say it's around $20 for 50 strips. You can get the name brand ones online for less though if you decide to go with one of those.
 
The wal-mart one you're speaking of is the relion meter and it's wonderful. I recently switched to it and I'm really happy with it. It's pretty cheap to buy the test strips and it uses a small amount of blood so it makes it a little easier on kitty too

I know it depends on where you live but I paid 8 bucks for the meter and another 19 bucks for 50 test strips
 
Most meters are fine, but I do recommend the Relion from Walmart. The meters are all cheap, where you run into problems are the test strips, and the relion has the cheapest strips (in a reliable fashion) I've seen. Some strips you buy in bulk online may be cheaper, but the relion has the advantage that you can run to Wally World and buy more when you need them.
 
An added benefit of the Relion meter is that you can get generic replacement strips from ADW for significantly less than Walmart charges. The Arkray Glucocard 01 is the generic version.

Many of us order from this site. If you're interested, there is a 10% coupon code good for the next two days, PET922, and if you link from Mr. Rebates, you'll get an additional 4% cashback. All orders over $100 (after coupon is deducted) also get free shipping.
 
Thanks all! Looks like the Relion is the way to go.

Ozzie has a vet appointment next Tues to check his levels.

Would home testing be something I should address with my vet?

How do I know what is normal/ how to regulate insulin if I am doing this at home?

Sorry, just soooo new to this I am just trying to get the hang of everything!
 
Dear Vivian (and you, too, sweet Ozzie),

You could say to your vet: "I'm going to home-test his BG".

Believe it or not, some vets are not supportive of home-testing.

But don't let the vet talk you out of it. Ozzie is your cat. Your baby.

Home testing is the only way you can be sure it is safe to give insulin before
each shot. And the only way you can determine how the insulin is working for
your cat.

Remember, some cats are very stressed at the vet. Vet-stress can raise the
BG reading at the vet by 100 points or more. Then the vet prescribes too
much insulin. Not good.

We will help you every step of the way.
 
The Target brand meter is also pretty good, and very affordable ($9 I think?). Since Max is OTJ, I don't want a huge stock of strips laying about, and the Target brand sells 25 strip vials as well as the 50s. I also don't happen to shop at Walmart, so the Relion wasn't an option for me. Just wanted to throw that one out there--until someone else here mentioned it to me, I didn't know Target had a meter--but I'm there ALL the time. :-)
 
Posted before I was finished...lol.

I would address home-testing with your vet. And then if he/she isn't supportive of it, I'd probably start shopping for a new vet. It really is the best way to go, and the ONLY way you'll get your cat to remission or OTJ (off the juice) status. My vet had never had a diabetic cat patient before, but she did recommend home-testing and was very supportive of it. And it saved me oodles of money on tests at the vet's office--I set up the spreadsheet recommended here at FDMB and followed all the notes and helpful hints from everyone here, and when my vet wanted an update, I just emailed her the spreadsheet. She could see he was in good hands, and knew I understood what I was doing, and in only 6 weeks Max was OTJ. :-)

And anything you need to know, post it here, and someone will know the answer! Good luck!
 
Oz man went to the vet this afternoon. Blood Glucose was at 350 still. We are increasing from 2 units to 3 units. The lady vet was in today, and Ozzie and I love her! I asked if I could test Ozzie at home and she said absolutley! :-D She also has a diabetic kitty at home, so it was comforting to have a vet who understands how important monitoring is.

The vet trip cost me $77 :( I think between Ozzie's constipation episode hospitilization and asthma diagnosis at the beginning of the year, plus the ear infection (which we now know was from the diabetes) it's cost me upwards of $4,000. I cannot put a price tag on him, but I am also not going to pay $300 a month to have him test weekly at the vet. I keeping his appt for the 15th, and I hope to have the hang of the testing by then. Hoping he'll regulate soon!!

I picked up a Relion Confirm and 20 test strips from Walmart.

Figure I'll try tomorrow on him before one of his insulin doses.

I'd like to start a spreadsheet too...... but I may need a simpler one to get started.

If anyone has any advice on testing- like how much ideally I should be doing it, or how to get a spreadsheet started that would be great.

-Vivian & Ozzie
 
At the very least you will want to test before eah injection to make sure Ozzie is high enough to safely give insulin to. Now in a perfect world you will also want to get spot checks in during the day especially around his nadir or lowest point usually about 6 hours after the injection to see how far down he is going. Then once a week or so you will want to run a curve which is testing every 2 hours between one 12 hour cycle. In other words, either between his morning shot and his evening shot or between his evening shot and his morning shot if you're a nigh owl...lol. But that is in a perfect world, so don't stress out if you can't always get those spot checks in...life happens.

Mel, Maxwell, Musette & The Fur Gang
 
We don't have a Wal-Mart here, so I haven't had a chance to try Relion. I've been using the same Contour meter since Ragnar was diagnosed 2 1/2 years ago, and love it. I've tried others - some take the blood with the edge of the strip, and it's much easier to take it from a cat's ear with the end, as Contour does. Aviva also takes it from the end, but the strips are programmed to absolutely quit working after their expiration date, but strips really will work a month or two after, so that's a troublesome feature with your strips.

I got my Contour meter in the newbie kit here on FDMB and paid only about $5 postage. You can probably get one absolutely free by calling Bayer, 800-348-8100. Just tell them you heard their Contour meter was good and would like to try it. Don't tell them it's for a cat unless they ask (which they definitely won't). ;-)

Strips are expensive in the drug store, but I get mine on eBay for usually under $20 for 50 including shipping. Someone usually has a Buy It Now for around $18.50.

Blessings!
 
There's absolutely no reason to pay for expensive vet testing. It's not only far cheaper to do it yourself at home, it's more accurate. Cats need to be tested multiple times a day, not once a week, to see how insulin is effecting their blood sugar. Going to vet also stresses the cat out and gives inflated numbers, which leads to overdosing more often than not.

I never once paid for blood glucose testing at the vet since Bandit was diagnosed in 2009, and he's a happy, healthy kitty in remission. In fact, when I asked about office testing at diagnosis my vet told me exactly what I just said, that it was unreliable and they only did testing at the office if the owner refused to test at home. I also couldn't afford office testing even if I wanted to. I realize I was extremely lucky that I had good vet advice from the beginning, though.
 
Vhens2211 said:
Oz man went to the vet this afternoon. Blood Glucose was at 350 still. We are increasing from 2 units to 3 units.
Click to expand...

I am sorry to say but this type of dosing adjustment gets more cats into trouble than I can count.

You should never base the dosage on a single test. That 350 tells you nothing in terms of whether you are giving him too much or too little insulin.

Also, your vet increased by a full unit which is another common mistake.

Please see Julia's first paragraph above.

I deal with a lot of overdosed cats and they get into their dangerous state because of this type of management.

Good for you in that you will be home testing very soon but please understand that if proper curves (impossible to do in a vet hospital due to the common issue of stress induced hyperglycemia) have not been performed, you may very well be giving a dosage of insulin that is too high. Right now, you have no data to support the dosage you are giving unless curves have been run.

Please see my Diabetes page below. That page also has a home testing section on it but hopefully you already have that under control.
 
Hi Dr. Lisa,
I just wanted to let you know that Vivian has gotten him back down to 1u BID, and she's posting regularly in the PZI forum, doing lots of testing, and Ozzie is doing pretty well so far.

Carl in SC
 
Thanks so much for letting me know.

I figured that you guys would take good care of her.

However, the burning (rhetorical) question is......when will my colleagues learn how to logically - and *safely* - manage diabetic cats? And was anything learned in this case so that this type of management style is not repeated?
 
Tonight in her thread for today's cycles, she asked the question "what am I supposed to tell my vet when he finds out I am not giving 2.5units?" I, and others replied "print out your spreadsheet and give it to him. He can't argue against good numbers." The hope is that after his patient nearly hypo'd after 3 units, and then responded well to several cycles of 1 unit, he'll learn something from that. Hopefully his next patients will benefit from that.
I know that my vet was very receptive to my experiences here, and we both learned a great deal. Thank YOU for being here. The wisdom you share has affected thousands of lives - human and feline alike.
Carl
 
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