Not sure what dose (if any) I should give

[Snuggles and Danny]

Hi,

Snuggles has been on Caninsulin for 3 months and his blood sugar has come down nicely since he started - he was on 1 unit but I was getting very quick nadirs so I (in consultation with the vet) reduced it to .5 and stuck with that for a while, his levels continued to fall gradually. His spreadsheet is in my signature.

Last week Snuggles was 6.1 (110) at am+0, then 6.5 (117) at am+5, then 6 (108) at pm+0. Since his Caninsulin nadir is around +5 or +6 that means that his own insulin brought the numbers down again doesn't it? I decided to stop shooting for a few days to see what happened, and he stayed just mostly between 5.8 (104) and 6.7 (121) for several days. It seems that the most important thing for him is regular meals, because when I have to go out early, and leave food down for him, he often doesn't eat it, and then is very hungry, and has a higher bg when I get home.

Today he mostly ignored his lunch and his bg was much higher at pm+0 9.4 (169). I didn't shoot, but he had a big dinner and at pm+1 was down to 8.5 (153) and at pm+4 to 5.5 (99). He had a snack at pm+4 after the shot.

How do you think I should proceed? The bgs since I stopped shooting a few days ago are pretty similar to the preceding few weeks - not eating regularly causes a spike but otherwise he's around 100-120 preshot. I bought an automatic cat feeder but he's scared of it and hisses and backs off -it's one of the rotating ones so I will try a flip-top and see if it's less scary (I think it's the whirring noises which bother him). My vet is very supportive, but I don't think she has much experience in this area.

Oh, just noticed I also started a new container of test strips the day I decreased the dose, and it's been very cold, which apparently can cause meters to test high - in the morning the heating isn't on yet, and the strips and meter are cold - too many variables!

Thanks for any advice,

Amy

 

[Blue]

Hi,

Snuggles has been on Caninsulin for 3 months and his blood sugar has come down nicely since he started - he was on 1 unit but I was getting very quick nadirs so I (in consultation with the vet) reduced it to .5 and stuck with that for a while, his levels continued to fall gradually. His spreadsheet is in my signature.

Last week Snuggles was 6.1 (110) at am+0, then 6.5 (117) at am+5, then 6 (108) at pm+0. Since his Caninsulin nadir is around +5 or +6 that means that his own insulin brought the numbers down again doesn't it? I decided to stop shooting for a few days to see what happened, and he stayed just mostly between 5.8 (104) and 6.7 (121) for several days. It seems that the most important thing for him is regular meals, because when I have to go out early, and leave food down for him, he often doesn't eat it, and then is very hungry, and has a higher bg when I get home.

Today he mostly ignored his lunch and his bg was much higher at pm+0 9.4 (169). I didn't shoot, but he had a big dinner and at pm+1 was down to 8.5 (153) and at pm+4 to 5.5 (99). He had a snack at pm+4 after the shot.

How do you think I should proceed? The bgs since I stopped shooting a few days ago are pretty similar to the preceding few weeks - not eating regularly causes a spike but otherwise he's around 100-120 preshot. I bought an automatic cat feeder but he's scared of it and hisses and backs off -it's one of the rotating ones so I will try a flip-top and see if it's less scary (I think it's the whirring noises which bother him). My vet is very supportive, but I don't think she has much experience in this area.

Oh, just noticed I also started a new container of test strips the day I decreased the dose, and it's been very cold, which apparently can cause meters to test high - in the morning the heating isn't on yet, and the strips and meter are cold - too many variables!

Thanks for any advice,

Amy

Hi Amy,
It looks like you are getting pretty good numbers with no insulin. I don't know about the others, but if you are seeing BG dropping after eating and nicely dropping to 99, maybe just keep testing and fingers crossed that he just needed a helping hand for a bit.

 

[Karen & Pearl]

I totally would not shoot! It really sounds like possible remission. I was never so fortunate, but usually when you start seeing this kind of thing, when you test and see a higher number like that 169, give just a very small bit of food. It will stimulate the pancreas and you should see a decrease. I've also seen it advised to do more small meals more frequently for the same reason. Wow, good job. Did you switch to a low carb food? What's he eating?

 

[akbahsMum]

That's a lovely looking spreadsheet Amy.
I'm not expert enough to do anything but admire its lovely blue colours.
(But I also would be inclined not to shoot, but to continue monitoring before every meal).(But I wouldn't know).
I learn a lot from looking at how other people are going. Feed to lower BG's, well well. That would be low carb of course.
And I wonder, what is a "small" amount. Look at me flooding your thread with my questions, so rude.
:?

 

[Karen & Pearl]

That's a lovely looking spreadsheet Amy.
I'm not expert enough to do anything but admire its lovely blue colours.
(But I also would be inclined not to shoot, but to continue monitoring before every meal).(But I wouldn't know).
I learn a lot from looking at how other people are going. Feed to lower BG's, well well. That would be low carb of course.
And I wonder, what is a "small" amount. Look at me flooding your thread with my questions, so rude.
:?

I'd say a small amount is a tablespoon or so, maybe two.

 

[Snuggles and Danny]

Snuggles has been on a low-carb diet since he was diagnosed (a few days before he started insulin). He currently eats Felix "As good as it looks" chicken (I'm not sure if that exists outside the UK).

Yesterday his 9.4 was at feeding time (when I got home from work) so he had a lot more than a tablespoon of food! And he's a big cat - 18 pounds - so I don't think he'd be very impressed with a tablespoon! I would love to feed him more smaller meals but I haven't figured out how - if I'm at home it's easy but when I'm out he often ignores perfectly good food and stays hungry. He always gets at least 4 meals a day; I've tried frozen pucks of wet food with mixed results, and will be experimenting with different kinds of automatic cat feeders.

Snuggles bg was 6.2 (111) just now (morning UK time) after 8 hours of kitty and human sleep - yay!

 

[DaniCoz]

I can only speak from my own experience, and I haven't been doing this very long, but you are seeing results very similar to Charlie once he went on low carb. In fact, once I switched his diet and began testing, he never got another shot (it has only been two weeks, but I'm super happy!) I got a suggestion to test, feed, then test two hours after he's eaten to see if his pancreas is working. That's what I did, and you can see my results...considering the 20% variability in the strips, Charlie's pre food and post food numbers were almost exactly the same. I would try that, but if Snuggles continues with those BGs after two weeks, I would think he was diet controlled!!! Of course you'll want to keep testing, but no more shots!