QUICK QUESTION..

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christina52388

christina52388

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We had an episode of hypoglycemia 2 nights ago requiring hospitalization so hes been on 1 unit of ProZinc since this morning only. (He was on 3 units 2x day before the episode). He hasn't wanted to eat his wet food, but grazes on the dry all day (not sure how much hes actually eaten since being home from the vet since he doesn't seeem to have much of an appetite) so I gave him 1 unit tonight since his reading was so high. I want to quit the dry food since I read about how bad it is and the brand we have seems to be pretty bad...(Hill's prescription w/d) so I'm assuming its a bad idea to remove the dry food tonight? I don't know if the 1 unit without anymore food could be harmful even tho his reading was so high.? I want him to be hungry in the morning so we can get on an eating pattern but its difficult when he doesn't want his wet food lately and I know the dry food is so bad for him :? Any ideas?
 
christina52388 said:
We had an episode of hypoglycemia 2 nights ago requiring hospitalization so hes been on 1 unit of ProZinc since this morning only. (He was on 3 units 2x day before the episode). He hasn't wanted to eat his wet food, but grazes on the dry all day (not sure how much hes actually eaten since being home from the vet since he doesn't seeem to have much of an appetite) so I gave him 1 unit tonight since his reading was so high. I want to quit the dry food since I read about how bad it is and the brand we have seems to be pretty bad...(Hill's prescription w/d) so I'm assuming its a bad idea to remove the dry food tonight? I don't know if the 1 unit without anymore food could be harmful even tho his reading was so high.? I want him to be hungry in the morning so we can get on an eating pattern but its difficult when he doesn't want his wet food lately and I know the dry food is so bad for him :? Any ideas?
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Welll, your cat needs to eat even if it's junky W/D. Getting food into your cat is more important than the diabetes right now. Not eating can result in fatty liver disease. If you mix a few pieces of W/D into the canned food, will he eat it? Have you tried treats on top of the canned? Maybe a teeny bit of the gravy from a gravy-based canned/pouched food to entice eating?

Ask your vet about possibly giving your cat an appetite stimulant medication or for a product called FortiFlora. FortiFlora is a powdered probiotic that can also be used to entice inappetant cats to eat. Just sprinkle on food. It's really really appealing that even the sickest cat will eat a little bit of food.
 
I would not suggest removing all the dry at once. Cats are often much more sensitive to insulin after a hypo, so I think that you need to be extra careful regarding changing diet.

A couple of questions will help us help you. Are you home testing? What is the wet food that you are (trying to) feed him?

A couple of ideas to get him to eat - sprinkle parmesan cheese on his wet food. Microwave it a few seconds - seems to become more smelly and appeals to some cats. Canned baby food meat - check the label to be sure NO onions or garlic. A little cheddar cheese. Yoghurt - unsweetened, plain. You can also try crushing a bit of the dry food if he likes it and sprinkling on the wet food. Fortiflora is another product that you can get from the vet that you sprinkle on the wet food. Most cats love the stuff.

I think that people generally transition from dry to wet over several days, perhaps up to a week. More wet and less dry.

Others will be along to offer other ideas. If you are home testing and have some test results, those would really help as well.
 
Well I guess the main problem right now is that he doesn't seem to have much of an appetite for anything including the w/d. He could possibly be one of the pickiest/most stubborn eaters. We feed him Soulistic wet food, he will only eat the Tuna kind (which I just read is bad to feed cats solely fish type food? But at 15 years old and diabetic it would definitely be impossible to get him on anything other than that.) I did try to get him to swallow an appetite stimulant which we have for my other cat but I couldn't get him to swallow it and I obviously can't conceal it in wet food since he won't eat any right now. I also bought 2 different types of treats today- neither of which he would eat lol...I recently started home testing. I forgot to mention, his reading was 347 tonight so I went ahead and gave him 1 unit of ProZinc. A few details on the hypo incident- I got home a little after 1am on Aug 4 (Thurs) and could tell he was hypo so I did a test and it said Lo. Rushed to the vet etc. Picked him up in the morning from the hospital and brought to our regular vet and was brought home around 5pm. No insulin was given until Friday morning when I tested and read 400 something and was told by the vet to give 1 unit. Tested again around 1pm today and read 200 something so was told to give no insulin if it drops or stays, but give insulin if it increases which it did. I was just a little nervous because I'm not sure how much he actually ate, it could have been a very small amount. By the way, 24 hours before the hypo incident I tested him and he was 300 something. So for some reason he;s all over the place and I feel like the dry food (as well as 24/7 access to it) could be one of the contributing factors in that. Any ideas on that? & thanks for the tips for feeding I'll definitely try some of those things. && additionally, no matter how much he refuses HIS food, he will still beg and beg and beg anytime WE have chicken, fish, or bacon!? But he won't eat chicken cat food!
 
++ when tested and spoke to the vet at 1pm, the instructions to give or not give insulin were regarding when I checked him again at 730pm (meal time) not in the middle of the day.
 
I am a bit confused regarding your schedule. ProZinc, like all most insulin for cats, should be given on consistent 12 and 12 hour schedule. ProZinc is a little more flexible, as I understand, in being able to move early or later to accomodate a dinner date or other event (maybe up to an hour when you have enough testing data to know how your kitty will react to this type of change).

Are you able to test regularly tomorrow? Perhaps you could test every 2 hours and post your results. That would give members who use your insulin some data to review (as well as your vet) and offer suggestions.

THis is the easiest way to post so that members in all time zones can follow:
AMPS (morning, preshot test) xxx
+2 (2 hours after shot) yyy
+4 (4 hours after) zzz
+6 well, you get the idea.

To find out just how much (or little) .25 u would be, take a used syringe and a glass of water. Draw up .5 u and then very carefully expel it drop by drop. Half of that would be .25 u. You could do the same with insulin and a new syringe when you have it figured out, but keeping the second half to inject. I haven't explained this too well I fear. I'm starting to fade...hopefully someone else can do better in the morning.
 
Have you ever tried the 'Pill Popper' plunger? ShuShu (civvie) takes asthma meds fairly often but will dig a pill out of anything and sometimes even brings it back to me. He'd bite and freak out when I tried to do the hand thing too. I bought one of the pill poppers - put soft rubber tip in mouth, hit the plunger. Pill shoots to the back of his mouth, he swallows and it's done. No fights, no freaking out.....a treat follows...
 
Sorry for the confusion...he gets Pro Zinc at 7:30 am and pm. Before the hypo event he was at 3 units. Since then, I've only been giving him 1 unit per injection time if the reading is in the 300's which it has been before each meal/injection time. When I say meal I'm referring to the wet food. We currently leave Hill's w/d dry out all the time which I don't want to do anymore because I think it can be causing some of the extreme variations in him since its not low carb and I never know how much he's actually eaten thru out the day. 'Just-as-appy' you lost me completely on the last thing you said, and I'm wondering is it ok to prick his ears so many times in one day? I would like try to to make a rough glucose curve on my own but I don't know about his poor little ears.
 
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