Newly Diagnosed Need Support and Feedback

[Shelly and Bodhi]

My 10 year old male cat, Bodhi, was diagnosed 2 months ago. After following the local vet's advice he was up to 6 units twice a day of Prozinc. The vet kept increasing the dose each time, based on the BG test at the office every two weeks. After reading everything online, especially www.catcare.org, I knew something was wrong and I contacted Dr. Pierson. Started home testing, reduced the dose from 6 to 3 units twice a day and got lower readings right away, which means Bodhi was being overdosed. We are on the fourth day of home testing, which is going well (Bodhi is very mellow which makes it easier) but the whole thing is pretty overwhelming. I am trying to be positive and the goal is to get him off insulin, and at least we have a chance now. I am not very good with computers and having lots of trouble getting the chart onto Google Sheets (still have not figured it out). It took me hours just to get to this point on this website and am not sure it will work, so for now I will stop and try to post and see what happens. Thanks to all for sharing.

 

[Carl & Polly & Bob (GA)]

Hi and welcome to the board! Happy to hear that you were able to contact Dr. Lisa and that she got you back on course. Yeah, 6u twice a day based only on numbers at the vet office is pretty extreme!

Awesome that you are home testing too! Can you tell us when you test? Of course, we advise always testing before each and every shot. But are you testing in between shots too? With Prozinc, the preshot tests are critical (if for no other reason that to be sure the BG is not too low to give a shot). But the "nadir" of the cycle, the lowest number, is also important to know. That "should" happen between 5-7 hours after giving insulin. If you know the highs and the lows, it makes it easier to tell how well a given dose is really working.

Also, can you tell us what Bodhi eats? What type of food and how much, and when during the day or night?

 

[Shelly and Bodhi]

Thank you Carl and Bob! Yes, we are testing as Dr. Lisa suggested -- always pre-shot and at +5, +6, etc. until the number increases. So far the pre-shot numbers are high (in the 350 range and one 442 last night), but some of the mid-cycle numbers have been good (in the 90's and 100's). We are down to 2 units twice a day per Dr. Lisa's advice. We are feeding Bodhi the Purina DM canned food (only because we had already bought a case and she said it was o.k.) and some Fancy Feast Classic and Friskies pate. He is off dry food completely except a few nibbles for a treat after testing. Luckily my boyfriend is home during the day (he's a musician) since I work days so he is here to do the testing. He also does the shots since I am terrified of it, and we are so fortunate to have a roommate who will do it if he is not here. When I first heard Bodhi had diabetes I could not believe it, since there is no way I can give a shot. I am going to try to work my way up to it but so far I can't even look when he is doing it. I want to work with Dr. Lisa for awhile until we understand everything better, but it is expensive and I have already spent a fortune so I've got to use the board. Where do people post their charts? Thanks again! Shelly

 

[Shelly and Bodhi]

I forgot to answer your question about how much food and when. We are giving him 1 1/2 cans per day, about 4-6 times per day beginning at 3:30 a.m. (when my boyfriend gets up), then some before his am shot, some at lunch, some at dinner before pm shot, and a little later in the evening. He is always hungry so it's hard not to give him too much.

 

[Carl & Polly & Bob (GA)]

Shelly,

The canned DM is fine as long as he'll eat it. It's low carb, but I think only comes in one flavor so sometimes they burn out on it. If that happens, vets will take it back and give you a refund. They don't care, Purina refunds them, or they just use in at the clinic.

What instrument(s) does BF play? I play guitar as a hobby, so just curious. Great that you have him plus another roommate that can help with the testing and shooting. It can be done "alone" but having willing helpers is a huge benefit. I've seen others join the board that never thought they'd be able to give a shot, and you'll "get there", don't worry. :smile: I'd never given a shot before Bob got diabetes, but I wasn't reluctant to give them. After the first couple, it was no big deal to me, or to him. The ear pokes were more difficult to get efficient with, but he was very patient with my attempts to draw blood. All he cared about was the treat (fresh shrimp) that followed.

People go to googledocs and use a pre-made template for their spreadsheets, and then attach them as a link in their "signature". Have you see the instructions for how that is done in the Tech Forum?

Your feeding schedule sounds great. Multiple meals seems to help rather than just two meals a day at shot time, which unfortunately is what many vets recommend for some reason. I figured Dr. Pierson would have you doing things "right" though. ;-) Bodhi will be "always hungry" for a while. Once his numbers become better regulated, you'll see his appetite return to his pre-diabetes levels.

 

[Shelly and Bodhi]

Mark (BF) plays fiddle, guitar, and flute. We love your photo of your kitty with the guitar. I just realized that most people have their name and their cat's name as the signature. I will see if I can change mine. As far as the chart/spreadsheet, I was able to download it onto my desktop but could not get it to post to Google Dogs so that other can see it. I will try to find the directions on here as they might be different. Dr. Lisa sent them to me and I followed them but there was no place to click on "Open with" or "Google sheets". Do you post charts? Where can I find other peoples' charts on here? Thank you!

 

[Shelly and Bodhi]

Ignore my question about whether you post charts -- I just saw that your cat is diet controlled. That is very encouraging to see he was only on Prozinc for 10 weeks. It seems like most of the cats on this board are on Lantus. Our local vet recommended Prozinc and Dr. Lisa said to keep using it for now since we already have it.

 

[Carl & Polly & Bob (GA)]

Bob was actually on "compounded bovine PZI", which is a little different from Prozinc, but basically "the same" as far as how the treatment goes.
Most people have their Spreadsheet links in their signature. I never did a SS for Bob, as most of his time on insulin was before I found this great place. I used to just keep everything in a logbook.

Here are the instructions for "how to" from creating one to adding it to your signature.

http://felinediabetes.com/FDMB/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=18207

I just realized that most people have their name and their cat's name as the signature

If you're talking about your screen name (like mine is Carl & Bob), that's easy to change. Just click on the "user control panel" link at the top left of the screen.
Then click on the "profile" tab. Then to the left, you'll see "Edit account settings"? The top box shows your "username" and you can change it to whatever you want.
Then if you click on the "edit signature" tab on the left, you can enter information (up to 255 characters) of anything that you want to appear at the bottom of all of your posts. Like the link I have to my "photos", or any quotations you might want to put there or whatever. That's where your SS link will eventually go too.

If you have any questions specific to how the board works, or how to edit stuff like your signature, you can post questions in the Tech Support forum and somebody can help you out. It sometimes takes a day or two before somebody sees your question, but most of the time, you'll have an answer pretty quickly.