Not off to a good start home testing/Lantus questions

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Phil & Garfunkel

Phil & Garfunkel

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I received my newbie kit from Lori and Tom and spoke with her a few times, but I'm having some difficulties succeeding with home testing. I received a OneTouch UltraMini glucometer.

This morning:
1) The first time I pricked his ear, I don't think I did it deep enough, as I didn't see any blood come out, though there was a red mark.
2) The second time I pricked his ear some blood came out, but very, very little. Too little for the meter to suck any into the test strip.
3) The third time I pricked his ear I did it too deep and I think I went completely through to the other side, like a piercing. Blood did come out, the test strip sucked it up but the meter gave me an Er5 message, which according to Google could mean that the strip was damaged, or the strip wasn't completely filled with blood. It wasn't completely filled with blood, but I'd say about 85% of that surface area was.

Just now before his evening shot I tried to give it another go and I got the same Er5 message. Again, the strip wasn't completely saturated in blood, but I'd say about 85% of it was and there was still blood on his ear, the unit just wasn't sucking more into it, so I assume that's a sufficient level of blood.

I think I have to go and buy a vial of the control solution to make sure the glucometer/strips are okay now.

How sensitive are the strips? If I touch the surface area where the blood goes while getting it out of the bottle, is that strip shot? What about the other end that feeds into the glucometer? It seems difficult to pick the strips out of the bottle without touching either end in some way. It's not like they're individually sealed or anything.

Now here are my various Lantus questions:

1) The Lantus website says "LANTUS® is the only insulin approved exclusively for use once a day." So why do we end up giving our cats two shots a day? Is it because their body volume is so much smaller than us, so they can't handle one (presumably larger) shot a day?
2) The Lantus website also shows in the vial injection instructions guide to swab the top with an alcoholic pad before inserting the needle each time. Is this necessary? It wasn't mentioned at the vet and I'm just curious if anyone here does that too.
 
the two questions Phil,
no you do not need to swab the syringe with alcohol...you are using a new syringe for every shot tho right?
and second the feline metabolism is much faster than the human one, thus it uses the insulin faster than would a human, which is why they take 2 shots a day rather than one.
 
The blood glucose monitor that I used on Rupert was very sensitive and QUICK - so I always made sure that I had everything ready, but didn't put the test strip into the port until I had pricked his ear and had a drop of blood. The monitor was ready to test in seconds. Perhaps you are inserting the strip too soon, and getting the error reading because it's timing out.
Good luck - you can do it!
 
I have a OneTouch Ultra Mini, too. If the strip isn't 100% filled with blood, it will give you that Er5. I just had it happen this morning; Trixie twitched just as I went to sip the blood. The strip filled about 98% of the way, and I got the Er5. I would guess your strips are fine, and maybe you just need to tweak the angle that your sipping the blood at. I've found that going in flat against the ear yields a quicker sipping action. Also, I have my lancing device set to 6. I tried setting it lower, but never got decent droplets from the lower settings.

I try to avoid touching either end of the strips, but I don't make myself crazy over it, either, and I've never had a problem as a result of touching the ends of the strips. In all the tests I've run on Trixie over the past 5 months, I've only come across one strip that was genuinely bad.

Are you warming his ear a bit before poking? A warm ear definitely gives better results. Also, over time, his ears will "learn" to bleed. We've all had many experiences like yours...needing to poke several times, poking all the way through with minimal blood, etc. Believe it or not, it all does get easier over time!

Congrats on getting started with your home testing...it's the best thing you can do for your kitty!

Amy
 
All good info above. Congratulations on home testing. I'm proud of you.

Here's our 12-step program
1) put everything out, warm sock and bring kitty to 'the place'
2) put the test strip just into the meter, but not enough to turn it on
3) warm the ear with a rice sock
4) lay sock down and pet kitty for a second - take a breath and reasure self and kitty that you can do it
5) pick up and arm lancet
6) push strip in
7) pierce ear
8) if blood does not immediately appear, milk ear a little to get a good drop of blood
9) sip blood until meter beeps and starts countdown
10) lay down meter
11) hold pressure on ear to stop bleeding
12) congradulate self with chocolate and wine,and kitty with treats, scritches and hugs

You will get the hang of it after a few tries. I started with the untra one touch, then moved to the Walmart Relion - cheaper and strips are sealed individually. Be calm - kitty will pick up on your emotions. You can do it. :)
 
I've successfully done it twice this morning. Why twice? Well, the first reading was very low... (38), so I was worried and wanted to re-test and got a 40.

It also took about six or seven stabs to get those two readings. He's not showing any signs of a hypo though... time to call the vet and make a new post.
 
Echoing Julia's concerns, I'm wondering what dose of Lantus you are giving him and is it being given once a day or twice per day?

The standard starting dose would be 1U twice a day, 12 hours apart. If you have recently switched to low carb, canned food, that may also be why he's reacting a little too well to the insulin dose.
 
Vicki he had been giving 2 units bid....i was also concerned about that but his vet curves were in the steeady 300's.
He's over in lantus now.
another 'catch' seemingly in the nick of time.
 
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