Panicking about insulin dose

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PatJ

PatJ

Member Since 2018
hello everybody, I'm hoping somebody can help me. My cat was diagnosed diabetic at the end of August this year and his BG levels have always stayed high. The vet has increased his insulin doses until they are now at 3 1/2 and although they are starting to drop a bit during the day he seems really unwell (ever since he went up to 3 units). He sleeps a lot, I know diabetic cats can get lethargic but his eyes don't look happy so I think he feels ill. He's been to the vet about it and they say he's fine. My vet wants to steadily increase his dose every week by 1/2 a unit until he maybe reaches 6 units. They increased it by 1/2 a unit on Wednesday evening and the next day he was really quiet and on Friday evening he wasn't really interested in eating so I didn't inject him. The next morning he was his old self again and I think it was because he hadn't had an insulin overdose of 3 1/2 units. I go to the vet every week with his blood glucose test results and I've tried to tell him that his numbers seemed better when he was on a much lower dose but he seems to think high numbers have better results. However, I gave him 2 1/2 units from yesterday morning and he was as bright as a button and his BG levels were 15.9 mmol/l this morning.Highly unusual. They went up to 17.9 mmol/L 3 hours later and 3 hours after that they went down to 9.0 mmol/l. Should I be worried, because I've done this without my vet knowing and I've no idea how much insulin I should give him for his next shot this evening. I really don't want to give him a high dose again because I'm sure it's making him ill, although I know I could be wrong. Does anybody have any idea about what dose to give him if his BG is below 20 this evening? I could phone my vet to ask but they would probably say continue with the 3 1/2 . I'm sorry if this is a bit garbled but I feel a bit panicky. I'd be really grateful if somebody could help. by the way his insulin is Prozinc. Thanks so much if you can help, PatJ
 
Welcome! You've come to the right place. :) Your gut is telling you that what the vet is suggesting isn't working well. I think you're right. Are you testing your kitty's BG at home? That's the key to figuring out whether dosing is working or not. Most of us ended up here because we tried to follow our vet's instructions but had no success. We decided to learn more and take matters into our own hands and then we saw progress. It requires a leap of faith on your part because it's normal to trust the vet and is even harder if you like the vet for the rest of your kitty's care. We can help though.

Here are my suggestions:
  • click on your name in the upper right corner of this page
  • click on "signature" in the men that drops down
  • type the following in the box that opens: kitty's name/age/date of diabetes diagnosis/insulin you're using /glucose meter you're using/what he eats/any other meds or health issues he has

  • another thing that will help us help you now that you've started BG testing at home is to set up a spreadsheet like the one we use here. We can all see it and look at it before offering advice: http://www.felinediabetes.com/FDMB/threads/fdmb-spreadsheet-instructions.130337/
  • post on the ProZinc forum for insulin specific advice.
 
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Kris, Thank you so much for replying to me about the insulin dosing. He has now gone down to 5.6 mmol/l in 2 hours from9.0mmol/l never happened before, hope it doesn't go any lower.I hope I haven't made things worse for him.I really have tried to find the signature but it doesn't show up on this computer so please don't think I'm ignoring you. Will keep trying but no menu has dropped down to write information in PatJ
 
That's a pretty steep drop. Can you give him a snack to help slow him down? And will you be around for a few hours so you can do a few more tests?

Don't worry about the signature right now, but if you could start a spreadsheet, that would really help.
 
Djamila Thank you so much for replying. Do you think I've shocked his system giving him a unit less than usual? he's never had such low readings all day - apart from when he had the somogyi ?( not sure how you spell it) effect a couple of times but he was all right. I know they would be good numbers if they hadn't arrived so quickly. Yes I will be around for a few hours. I've done another test which was 7.6 mmol/l and I did give him something to eat. I'm a bit paranoid about dosing him tonight. His numbers are usually in the 20's.Got an appointment in the morning to show the vet his BG numbers for the week and I'm not looking forward to it after changing the dose! Many thanks, PatJ
 
If you can get that spreadsheet set up, we could help you figure out what might be happening. Just knowing a couple of numbers doesn't give us enough information to really comment on what's happening.

It's a pretty big task to enter all of your data, but if you could enter the past week or so for now, that would really help. Then as you have time here and there you could input a bit more.

Honestly, I wouldn't worry about the vet too much ;)
 
Can't understand the spreadsheet as I'm not computer savvy, but I can copy his results as they appear in my book for the vet Here goes, hope it's all right
Sat 17 Nov/ 20.2mmol/l 8.10am 3 units / 22.1mmol/l 10.45am / 19.8mmol/l 1.30pm / 1 7.7mmol/l 2.45pm / 18 .7mmol/l 5.00pm
17.5mmol/l 6.00pm / 18.4mmol/l 8.00pm 3units

Sun 18 Nov 22.3mmol/l 8.15am / 19.0mmol/l 10.45am / 11.6mmol/l 3.00pm / 18.6mmol/l 6.10pm / 22.1mmol/l 8.00pm

Mon 19 Nov 20.1mmol/l 8.20am / 20.7mmol/l 11.00am / 17.5mmol/l 3.00pm / 17.3mmol/l 6.00pm
18.1mmol/l 3units / 20.0mmol/l 10.15pm
6.00
Tues 20 Nov 21.6mmol/l 8.00am 3 units 18.4mmol/l 11.40 am 16.2mmol/l 3.45pm 18.9mmol/l 6.00pm 21.4 @8.00 3uniTs
20.8mmol/l 10.35PM

WedNov 21 21.0mmol/l 8.10am 3units 24.6 mmol/l 9;00am 19.5mmol/l 11.15am 20.6mmol/l 4.45pm
15.6mmol/l 6.00pm 23.6mmol/l 8.00 3 1/2 units 18.6 -mmol/L 9.45pm 1mmol/l 11.15


Thurs 22 Nov 21.7mmol/l 8.15am 3 1/2 units 21.5mmol/l 10.45am 13.4mmol/l 2.45pm
20.5mmoL/l 8.20pm 3 1/2 UNITS

Fri 23 Nov 18.6mmol/l 8.20am 3 1/2 units 9.3mmol/l 5;00pm 10.3mmol/l 6.00pm
15.4mmol/l 8.00pm no injection hardly ate

Sat 24 Nov 21.1mmol/l 8.00am 2 1/2 units 21.8mmol/l 12.30pm 21.0mmol/l 4.00pm 22.5mmol/l 6.20
20.6mmol/l 8.20pm 2 1/2 units Hope this is all right PatJ
 
Djamila, Sorry to keep bending your ear. I've tested William three times since I texted you and his numbers are 7.6, 11.6 and now they've shot up to 22.2mmol/l. Would you know if I'd be safe to give him another lower shot i.e. 2 1/2 units or would you rather not comment? I'll have to sort out a spreadsheet but it's all Greek to me at the moment as I really don't understand computers. He always has his shots around 8-8.15 so will he be all right if it's too late and I have to wait till tomorrow morning? Thank you for getting back to me. PatJ
 
If you have a computer at home there are people here who will set up the spreadsheet for you so all you have to do is fill it in. @Chris & China is one of those people. :) Until you do it would be easier for us to read your data if you type it in a vertical column - eg.
Sat 24 Nov
AM Pre shot BG - 21.1
Dose - 2.5 u
BG after 4.5 hours - 21.8
After 8 hours - 21.0
etc.

Notice how I'm not referring to clock times but hours after a dose is administered. That's a better way to give time - easy to judge at a glance.
 
Pat, no need to ever apologize for asking questions around here! That's why we are all here: to work together to get all of this figured out.

I would not recommend giving another dose. Any dose you give is going to last for 10-14 hours, so if you give a dose now, the clock starts ticking on that one. Then when you give the next dose in your regular schedule, you get a weird overlap going on. I know it's so hard to see our fur babies in those higher numbers, but we just have to be patient and wait for the next regular shot time. :bighug:
 
Thanks Djamila, No, I didn't give him another shot just in case. Will have to wait till morning now. Hope he's not too high. Many thanks again for replying. PqtJ
 
Kris & Teasel said:
If you have a computer at home there are people here who will set up the spreadsheet for you so all you have to do is fill it in. @Chris & China is one of those people. :) Until you do it would be easier for us to read your data if you type it in a vertical column - eg.
Sat 24 Nov
AM Pre shot BG - 21.1
Dose - 2.5 u
BG after 4.5 hours - 21.8
After 8 hours - 21.0
etc.

Notice how I'm not referring to clock times but hours after a dose is administered. That's a better way to give time - easy to judge at a glance.
Click to expand...
Thanks for the good advice. I'll contact those people and get a spreadsheet sorted out. PatJ
 
To Chris and China, Hope you don't mind me contacting you. Kris and Teasel told me that you would be kind enough to set up a spreadsheet for me because I am no good on computers. If you would I'd be really grateful to you. Not sure what I have to do now or what information you will need so I'll wait to hear from you if that's okay with you. Many thanks in advance, PatJ
 
@PatJ Just click on my name and choose "start conversation" to send me a private message.

I'm on and off, so don't worry if you don't hear back from me right away

If you need to "tag" someone, put the @ sign in and then start entering the first few letters of their name....You'll get choices that pop up and you choose the correct one.
 
Withou
Chris & China said:
If you need to "tag" someone, put the @ sign in and then start entering the first few letters of their name....You'll get choices that pop up and you choose the correct one.
Click to expand...
(Using your tag as example Chris :))... if not putting the @ (@Chris & China) at beginning of name, you will not get the attention of person o_O.
You are doing a great job, “PatJ!
There is much, so much attention and help from great, selfless people on this forum!
 
@Krystina&Nelli, I think you sent me a message last night, but it didn't show up, just your name saying you'd sent a message, so I do apologise for not replying. I have apparently had 14 messages but have only seen 2, don't know what I'm doing wrong. PatJ
 
@Chris&China, Thank you so very much for the spreadsheet. I wouldn't have been able to do it and I'mvery grateful. Can you just tell me how I save the spreadsheet and who I have to send it to. The instructions are all in French and A bit confusing. Many thanks again PatJ
 
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