? Snickers' Questions on Remission, TR, and Our Vet

Snickers and Chrissy

Snickers and Chrissy

Member Since 2019
Hi, Snickers is doing really well, which our vet totally agrees with.

However, our vet is not convinced the .1 dose I'm giving Snickers twice a day is actually doing anything. She thinks it might be too low to be having an effect and that Snickers is actually in remission.

I'm not convinced about that though, as i think the .1 dosing has helped her a lot. Our vet thinks we should try stopping the insulin soon and seeing what happens. She wants to do a curve this Friday.

Due to Snickers' stomach issues, we've been super slow changing out her MC wet food to LC wet food. I'm mixing about half and half right now, and wondering if we made the full switch to LC if that might tip things in Snickers' favor remission wise and be the final thing we need to push her into remission.

I'm trying to follow the TR protocol but still fairly new to all this, so I guess my questions are...

1. If Snickers was in remission wouldn't giving her a .1 insulin shot be pushing her numbers even lower, like all 50s or even less?

2. What's the point of a curve this Friday? I test Snickers so much, isn't it like doing a curve every day?

3. Do you think switching to just LC might tip the scales into full remission? I would have done it already, but her stomach issues were soooo bad for soooo long, we had to move ultra-slow with trying a new food.

Anyways, hoping someone with more experience can take a look at Snickers' SS and let me know what they think. My vet asked for my thoughts on everything and is willing to listen to any ideas I have, I just want to make sure they're the correct ones. Thanks!
 
I don’t have advice on the dose but yes, everyday is curve day for some of us. Have you shown your vet the SS?

What are Snicker’s stomach issues? Does she have IBD? Have you thought about raw feeding? I know it’s not for everyone but here’s a great site that talks about raw feeding and stomach issues which I recommend even if you can’t feed raw:http://www.rawfeedingforibdcats.org/

Otherwise, I’m loving Snicker’s numbers!
 
Hi Chrissy - it looks like you could/should have reduced to one drop with the AM shot on 12/5 after the under 50s on 12/4pm. Then if Snickers held good numbers for a week, or went under 50, it would be time for an OTJ trial -- that's following the advice here and it worked great for us.
I agree you don't need to pay the vet for a curve with all the numbers on your SS.
I also know some kitties are quite carb sensitive, so all LC might make a difference, but what you are feeding now is giving nice numbers.
Looking really good:cat: Other than that 123 on the morning of the 5th, it looks like a week of good numbers (mostly between 50 and 80), which could also mean time to reduce to one drop. And Tina did go low on .1 before we went to a drop.

It's possible Snickers could come off now, but I've even heard from my vet (not the greatest at FD) to get to as low a dose as possible before stopping insulin. I'm not sure vets know how low we go!
 
Tina Marie and Jan said:
Hi Chrissy - it looks like you could/should have reduced to one drop with the AM shot on 12/5 after the under 50s on 12/4pm. Then if Snickers held good numbers for a week, or went under 50, it would be time for an OTJ trial -- that's following the advice here and it worked great for us.
I agree you don't need to pay the vet for a curve with all the numbers on your SS.
I also know some kitties are quite carb sensitive, so all LC might make a difference, but what you are feeding now is giving nice numbers.
Looking really good:cat: Other than that 123 on the morning of the 5th, it looks like a week of good numbers (mostly between 50 and 80), which could also mean time to reduce to one drop. And Tina did go low on .1 before we went to a drop.

It's possible Snickers could come off now, but I've even heard from my vet (not the greatest at FD) to get to as low a dose as possible before stopping insulin. I'm not sure vets know how low we go!
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Hi, thanks so much for the reply! I wondered about reducing the dose on those days, but when I looked here in the forums under the sticky note for TR protocol, is said this:

"Alternatively, if the nadir glucose concentration is 40 - <50 mg/dl at least three times on separate days, try lowering the dose. If the cat drops below 40 mg/dl once, reduce the dose immediately!"

Since she was between 40-50 only one day and never dropped below 40, I figured I should hold strong. Unless I'm misunderstanding that info?

It's good to hear from more experienced people :) I love my vet, but I don't think she gets the whole low dosing thing. I feel like Snickers isn't really ready to come off yet, but I think she's getting closer. Thanks for the advice!
 
The info you have above is for long term diabetics (over a year) or cats that don't hold reductions well! Since Snickers is pretty new to insulin, once under 50 gets a reduction!
My only experience was in 5 months with my own kitty - amazing all I've learned, but since every cat is different (ECID), and my experience is rather short, I might hesitate to give advice BUT was happy we found out why you didn't reduce!

I hope someone with more experience than me, comes along and advises;) If it were me, I think I'd start the one week count the cycle after the 123 . . .Then go to a drop. Let's see what others say - maybe you could reduce now(?)
 
Tina Marie and Jan said:
The info you have above is for long term diabetics (over a year) or cats that don't hold reductions well! Since Snickers is pretty new to insulin, once under 50 gets a reduction!
My only experience was in 5 months with my own kitty - amazing all I've learned, but since every cat is different (ECID), and my experience is rather short, I might hesitate to give advice BUT was happy we found out why you didn't reduce!

I hope someone with more experience than me, comes along and advises;) If it were me, I think I'd start the one week count the cycle after the 123 . . .Then go to a drop. Let's see what others say - maybe you could reduce now(?)
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Ohhhh, thanks for explaining that. Got it now. Okay, if she drops that low again I'll reduce. I was totally missing that point about long-term diabetics.

Okay, I'll start thinking about reducing her dose next week maybe. Thanks for your help!
 
Jan gave you some good suggestions. In addition, I think you need to get a couple more spot checks at night. If you see Snickers drop to the +2 at night, I think you should get a +3 to make sure she is staying safe. You want to make sure kitty is staying above 50 before calling it a night. For example, the PM cycle of the 4th, you got a test an hour after food at +2, but carbs can wear off after a couple hours. She might have gone lower at +4.

For newly diagnosed kitties that are holding reductions, and Snickers is doing that, reduce if she goes below 50 or you see a week in green. It’s for her safety. It’s uncommon, but we have seen kitties hypo on these small doses.

She’s looking good, really close.:D
 
Wendy&Neko said:
Jan gave you some good suggestions. In addition, I think you need to get a couple more spot checks at night. If you see Snickers drop to the +2 at night, I think you should get a +3 to make sure she is staying safe. You want to make sure kitty is staying above 50 before calling it a night. For example, the PM cycle of the 4th, you got a test an hour after food at +2, but carbs can wear off after a couple hours. She might have gone lower at +4.

For newly diagnosed kitties that are holding reductions, and Snickers is doing that, reduce if she goes below 50 or you see a week in green. It’s for her safety. It’s uncommon, but we have seen kitties hypo on these small doses.

She’s looking good, really close.:D
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Thanks! I'll try and get some more PM checks, though I think Snickers nadir is at +2 sometimes maybe +3. I don't think it goes any lower after that though. But still, I'll check to make sure it's not different at night. :)
 
Crista & Ming said:
I don’t have advice on the dose but yes, everyday is curve day for some of us. Have you shown your vet the SS?

What are Snicker’s stomach issues? Does she have IBD? Have you thought about raw feeding? I know it’s not for everyone but here’s a great site that talks about raw feeding and stomach issues which I recommend even if you can’t feed raw:http://www.rawfeedingforibdcats.org/

Otherwise, I’m loving Snicker’s numbers!
Click to expand...
Thanks! Yes, I've thought about raw. We got her an abdominal ultrasound a few months ago when she was having constant diarrhea and it showed nothing wrong, no signs of thickening intestines or any of that stuff. After much trial and error, and many other tests, I determined she had a poultry allergy, perhaps something else as well but I'm sure about poultry. Anyway, the only thing that didn't make her sick was Instinct Rabbit LID, though we've recently added Instinct Rabbit Original and she seems to be doing okay with the combo. Thanks so much for the link! :)
 
Sorry just seeing this now and glad to hear you got some help on the duplicate thread. It happens periodically I think because we maybe hit the post reply twice but that's just a guess.

Anyway, you'd have to delete each of your messages here which in turn would make the rest of the conversation with Adrienne and me just be hanging out there with no context. This thread is doing no harm and it will suffice to simply put a link here to the answered thread. :)
http://www.felinediabetes.com/FDMB/threads/snickers-questions-on-remission-tr-and-our-vet.222752/
 
MrWorfMen's Mom said:
Sorry just seeing this now and glad to hear you got some help on the duplicate thread. It happens periodically I think because we maybe hit the post reply twice but that's just a guess.

Anyway, you'd have to delete each of your messages here which in turn would make the rest of the conversation with Adrienne and me just be hanging out there with no context. This thread is doing no harm and it will suffice to simply put a link here to the answered thread. :)
http://www.felinediabetes.com/FDMB/threads/snickers-questions-on-remission-tr-and-our-vet.222752/
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Okay then, cool. Thanks so much. I'm sure I did something to screw it up, I just don't know. I didn't even realize it had done that until a little while ago. Thanks for your help, I won't worry about it then :)
 
I think you're doing great! Hold steady, reduce per TR and Wendy's comment above. Snickers sure is looking great! Nice job mama!!
 
Snickers and Chrissy said:
I just realized this posted twice for some reason. I'm not sure how to delete the second post. I have no idea why it did that.
Click to expand...
Merged.

In the future, please just PM one of us and we can take care of it. It came in as a “report” which is what we usually use if you are reporting a post by someone that does not seem to follow board rules. No problem at all......there is a learning curve. Thanks for letting us know about the duplicate.
 
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