The Cost of Diabetes

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JenBen2087

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I will first say that I am committed to providing great care for my pet(s) yet at the same time I just moved to a new city that is more expensive and I am looking for some ways to cut costs without cutting care.

My female cat Sara is almost 17 and was diagnosed this week with diabetes. I also have two 7 year old males who don't have diabetes. Prior to the diagnosis they were all on Hills Prescription W/D dry food. From the advice of my vet and this site I just switched them to wet Fancy Feast (the low carb kinds listed on the site) 2 days ago and Sara received her first insulin shot last night and then again this morning and seems to be perking up a bit already. Here are my concerns about cost:

I was told my insulin should last about 2 months and is $122 per vial which is $61 per month + syringes at $16 per month = $77 per month
Her glucose checks at the vet are $29 each + $23 for the visit and assuming they want to check her 1x or 2x per month = $51 or $102 per month
The Fancy Feast packaging says 1 can for every 2.5lbs of body weight. I need to give all 3 the same food so they don't try and eat one anothers plus I hear wet food is better for them anyway, but they don't even eat half of it so then I put some diabetic Royal Canin dry food out for them to snack on too which is $27 a bag. All 3 cats weigh about 10 lbs so that's 4 cans a day at $15 a 24 pack + dry food of $27 a bag = $252 per month

All of this together = $380 per month if I take her to the vet 1x per month and $431 if I take her to the vet 2x per month.

Like I said I want to provide the best care for my pets but I can't make money magically appear either. Any advice?
 
It is good that you changed to canned food. To reduce cost you can/should learn to do your own blood glucose testing using a human meter. You can look through the health forum for previous posts on meter selection. Regarding insulin, most people hear on Lantus (are you on it) buy the five package of 3 ml disposable pens or cartridges. Although the cost per ml is higher you can usually use up a pen/cartridge before it goes bad. Feel free to ask any other questions.
 
You can save money by hometesting your cat. Not only is it cheaper, it's much safer. The diet change alone will bring down your cat's blood sugar naturally and it's important to hometest during this time as you may need to lower the dose of insulin.

I buy my Fancy Feast when it's on sale, I stock up during those times. If you have a Walmart near you, FF is cheaper there and they have a glucometer that's inexpensive, the Relion.

Others will be by with some great advice for you. I just wanted to stop in quickly and say hi and let you know that there are ways to save money.
 
welcome.
as stated. testing blood sugar at home ends up being much cheaper in the long run and can save kitties life. knowing what sugar is before injecting can prevent a hypo.
the relion meter and strips are one of the cheapest out there. you can also save on food by going even cheaper, walmart special kitty, friskies, nine lives. my sams club has the 5.5oz cannot remember (0 lives or friskies) VALUE PACK OF 48 CANS FOR $17 something. walmart speicial kitty comes to $4 cheaper for same amount but these are the larger cans. I feed the cheapest I can afford and have had no il effects on my cats. all depends on what you can afford
rule of thumb. cats feed typically 6 oz/day however you want to divide that up. too fat, feed less, too skinny ,feed more
hope this helps and ask all the questions you need to.
someone has a link in how to test kitty and hopefully will post it. it really is easy. if you can give insulin, you can test too.
 
We use the relion meter from wal mart, I believe it was $9.00 for the meter and a few test strips. Wal mart sells 50 strips for $20.00, or 20 strips for $9.00 (for those tight weeks!). We also buy our syringes from wal mart, they run $12.44 for a box of 100 syringes in 10 sealed bags. We also use Special Kitty from wal mart, you can buy a 4 pack of 5.5oz cans (mocha loves the turkey and giblets) and it runs $1.34 for the four pack. We do buy the Fancy Feast gravy lovers at $.54 a can for those nights we need to bring up her numbers with gravy. Not sure what insulin you are on, but we are on lantus, and it is cheaper to buy through canada (with a prescription from your vet), I want to say it is $110.00 versus the average US price of $200.00. Each pen (you get 5 in the box) will last mocha approx. 28 days, but a lot of people seem to get much longer use out of a pen then we do. Every cat is different. I hope you are getting some good ideas here, and welcome!
 
Jen, first of all which insulin are you using? if $ is an issue you can use prozinc which is between 80-120 a vial, but it should last nearly a year.
next, forget all about going to the vet for curves. you need NEVER do that. we ALL curve our own kitties. we get more accurate results (less stressed kitty at home) and it will cost you the price of 4 or 5 test strips!
if you like i will mail you out a newbie kit which includes a meter, strips (20-30) a rice sock to warm the ear, lancets to prick the ear, a catnip toy and a vial of keto stix (IF NEEDED) all for the price of shipping and a donation IF you can. see my link below and order one.
Finally, since you have a family of kitties it is ok to also serve the larger less expensive cans of friskies etc. you can mix it up as $ is available.
all of that should cut your expenses by ALOT! and we are always here to walk you thru each and every step.
lori
 
The Frugal Feline Diabetes page: http://binkyspage.tripod.com/frugal.html

There are lots of ways to cut costs :thumbup

Insulin syringes: you don't need to use an expensive brand. Some brands are as little as $13 for a box of 100 while others cost nearly $30 for the same exact insulin syringe specifications. GNP, Monoject, and ReliOn (a Wal Mart brand) are among some inexpensive brands. If you live in the US, you can buy insulin syringes online with no prescription. Sometimes you can find coupon codes to use for free shipping or a certain percentage off. If you are using a U40 insulin such as ProZinc or PZI, you can use the U40 insulin syringes (which are not sold in any Human pharmacy) or U100 insulin syringes **with the dose conversion chart** (we can help you with that if you do decide to use U100 insulin syringes with U40 insulin).

Food: Fancy Feast is good but those tiny cans don't last long. Maybe instead of, or in addition to, that you can also feed a brand that comes in large cans. Wellness comes in 5oz and 13 oz cans which are more economical, for instance. Some brands you can buy in cases of 12 or 24 which can save money.

Blood glucose testing: You can do this at home :smile: All you need is a Human blood glucose meter which is available at any pharmacy. Test strips is what will cost you since you have to buy them every month or so, depending on how frequently you test. Some people use a meter that has inexpensive test strips such as Wal Mart's ReliOn brand.

Insulin: Depends on which one the vet has put your cat on. Lantus and Levemir are good insulin choices but are expensive. There are ways to cut costs down, such as using the pre-filled pens or cartridges instead of the 10ml bottle.
 
If you are using either Lantus or Levemir, before you refill your next prescription, ask your vet to write a new script for either the pre-filled pens or cartridges. You will still use it like a vial, using the syringe to draw the insulin. The difference is that with the vial, the insulin usually becomes ineffective long before the vial will be emptied and you will end up throwing away a lot of old insulin. If you switch to the cartridges or pens, you will probably use every drop because they are in smaller containers. The initial cost will be more than a vial, but you get 5 pens/cartridges. That will be enough insulin to last almost a year if you are giving 1 or 2 units twice a day.
 
Wow, thank you all so much for the advice and suggestions. I guess I should give some more information. Sara is on Prozinc Feline Insuline 2 units 2x daily and her 10ML bottle was $122.36 and I was told it should last about 2 months. They also supplied me with 100 U40 syringes for $37.96. I live in the United States. They want to see her back in a week for a check which I will do, but I will learn to check her BG myself at home starting today. They did a Frutosomine test on her earlier this week and it came back at 500 but no ketones in the urine so I guess she has had this for awhile. No symptoms came up until about 2.5 weeks ago when she started drinking water like crazy. I thought maybe it was the dry weather (I just moved to Las Vegas from Florida) but she had a loose tooth so I asked them to check her for diabetes when she had the tooth pulled. She seems more alert today although still sleeping alot.

I am going to check Wal-Mart and Costco today for a more economical yet nutritious food. I gave all 3 of them a total of 4 cans of Fancy Feast each yesterday in the morning and the evening and they didn't really eat more than one. I did have some dry prescription diabetic food my vet gave me out and they munched on an off through the day. I did this because I am concerned Sara won't eat enough. After reading more on these boards it appears I should take that food away and just do the wet food every 3 hours which includes before her daily injections??? Can someone confirm this is the right course? The vet also prescribed an appetite stimulant but she also prescribed eye drops for her because she has inflammation of the eyes caused by the diabetes as well. I haven't given her the stimulant since she has been somewhat interested in eating and to be honest I feel like I have been torturing her with the antibiotics and pain meds for her teeth being pulled 2 weeks ago, eye drops, insulin, and vet visits. Any thoughts on whether I should do the appetite stimulant too even though she is eating, just not all of her food? One more question. Does diabetes cause constipation/dry stool? She struggles with dry stool and constipation which the wet food should help, but she was on 1ml of Lactulose once a day for that. I took her off of it since Lactulose is sugar and not good for diabetes as you know.

Thank you so much for being here. People think I am crazy for the care I give my animals and I am SO tired of the cat lady comments because I have 3 cats. People can be so insensitive and ignorant and it is so nice to have a group of well intentioned and caring people to be around. I am attaching a pic of Sara and hopefully you can see it.
 

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OMG did you overpay for those syringes!
that prozinc should last you much longer than 2 months. 2 units twice a day along with diet change is a high dose that could potentially be dangerous. it would also be dangerous knowing that your cat is recovering from an infection as number may come way down and unless your testing you would'nt know.
this situation calls for immediate testing...a knowledge of no-shoot #'s and a rather early curve. earlier than a week.
it's a combination of events that causes me to say this.
please do not shoot that dose on your new diet. go to 1 unit until you are testing.
also you should have a hypo kit at the ready
this is not to scare you, actually, you are in a potentially good situation as your cat may not have the high #'s he came home from the vet with. do you know his dx #?
 
If she had a bad tooth, it may have caused a temporary increase in blood sugar -- when she heals up after the dental, and with a short course of insulin treatment, she may become "diet controlled" and not need insulin for very long.

If you use human syringes, you can get them for cheaper price than the pet ones -- but you would need to convert because the pet insulin is dilute compared to human insulin.
U40 (Prozinc) means there are 40 units of insulin in 1 cc (1 milliliter)of liquid
U100 (Lantus/Levemir) means there are 100 units of insulin in 1cc of liquid.

So.... you can buy 100 syringes for $17.49 from Hocks.com (for Monoject 31ga U100 3/10cc with half unit markings)
but you need to multiply your dose by 2.5

1u of U40 insulin = 2.5u marks on a U100 syringe because the difference in strength.

Cats may not eat as much as the can says -- (1 3oz can per 2.5# cat weight)

My 5 cats eat approx 30 oz of food per day (canned Wellness) and together, they weigh approx 62 pounds.

So -- that is only about half what the can says -- and my cats are allowed to eat as much as they want since they are not piggy gobblers.
 
Thanks all. I just tested her sugar via her ear like the videos showed and she was 227. She ate about 4.5 hours ago. Two weeks ago when she had the surgery her BG was 423. This past Wednesday was 299 and today was 227 so hopefully we are making some progress. I am not sure how fast it should be down after only 2 doses of insulin (1 last night and 1 this morning). She jumped when I pricked her so I hope I didn't hurt her but the bleeding stopped pretty quick. Will scour the board to see how often to test and what time to test as this is all new to me but I wanted to do it today based on one of the last posts to my thread about the diet and insulin together being potentially dangerous and making her hypo. She is sleeping right now (seems to do alot of that lately).

Should I go down to 1 unit 2x a day or stay at the 2 units 2x a day since she is only at 227 now?
 
This all sounds very good. Since I have no experience with insulin (Megan hasn't need it yet), I won't say anything about dosing. About the fact Sara jumped when you tested her, don't worry. She was probably just startled a bit by the novel experience. Megan jumped and yipped when I first tested her, but now she comes to me when I get the testing kit out and she purrs at the exclusive attention - I also have 3 cats.

It sounds to me as if you are doing very well and indeed are making progress. Good luck to you and to Sara!
 
sorry dx stands for diagnosis.
as far as reducing dose...that will remain to be seen until you can catch a +4 and a +6 hours after you shoot. and preferably without any food for an hour or more. you see your insulin hit's it's peak around that time. you don't want it to go much below 80 at this point. if it does than yes it would be good to reduce until you are very comfortable with all the changes in her diabetic life (infection clears, food intake)
can you get a +5 or so today.
when we use a +# it simply means that many hours since the last shot ok.
check your pm's....that upper left private message link.
 
lori is right, the prozinc will last you much longer than 2 months but for what it's worth, see this recent post in the pzi forum as some costco's now apparently sell it and i think one person said as low as $77/vial at her costco
viewtopic.php?f=24&t=27354

do you think she's eating enough to sustain herself? if so, i'd probably hold off on the appetite stimulant. but if you don't think she's eating enough, i'd use it. i think if you go by the label advice on the cans/bags, you end up overfeeding. dr. lisa pierson has some info on her nutrition site about how to feed, how much, etc.... http://www.catinfo.org

diabetes shouldn't cause dry stool/constipation. foods can or for that matter, kitty may just not process stuff too well. but you are right, i think the wet food diet should help with that. plenty of people here deal with that issue to so i'd bet you could start a thread with "what to use for constipation in diabetic cat?" type of subject line or use the search function with words like "constipation" or "lactulose" etc.... for instance, i think some use a dab of pumpkin if i remember correctly

also another fwiw, those syringes, if you are more comfortable sticking with the u40 syringes speak up 'cause i know there are several of us here who have some to pass along. for instance, if i remember correctly i've got a 100 or so sitting in my cabinets at home that i won't use and would be happy to send to you (we moved on to u100 syringes w/ conversion and then to another insulin anyway so i really have no need for them).
 
The 10 ml vial of ProZinc contains 400 units. At 2 units twice daily it should last for 3 1/3 months. Based on my experience with similar insulin (U, L, N PZI Vet and BCP PZI) you should be able to use up the vial.
 
http://binkyspage.tripod.com/CanFoodOld.html

Jennifer, the list I promised you. copy and take shopping with you. we all do it, who cares what people think :lol:

and btw, welcome to the VAMPIRE CLUB!!!!
you really took to it quickly and well.
your search for blood should'nt be restrained to only twice a day just yet.
but soon you will be satisfied with that.

Lori
and tomtom too!!
 
I too have a bunch of U40 syringes you can have, I just haven't gotten around to offering them to the Newbie kits. It often seems like they don't need them, most of us use the U100, easier to measure micro doses. My ex-vet charged even more than yours did and I'd like to see someone get good use from them.

Once your cats bodies adjust to the wet diet, they will self regulate on intake. right now (especially on dry food) they cannot use the calories they are taking in because they cannot metabolize them efficiently, so they are still hungry. Tess is about 9 lbs. and eats 5 to 5 1/2 oz. a day. There are a lot of foods with lower carbs on janet and Binky's list that are much less expensive to feed. Target is really cheap for Fancy Feast too. The important thing is to find a food they will eat. Tess snubs most of the premium foods I've tried.

Calories are more important than the weight of the food. The J&B list has the calories per can too. Figure roughly 15 calories for each pound the cat weighs per day as a starting point. Foods vary a lot in calories depending on the protein/fat carb ratio. Definitely read ALL of Dr. Lisa's articles, even if your cats aren't overwieght the obesity article has a lot of nutritional info.

Not much advice on the appetite stimulant other than seeing how much food she actually needs and trying different foods to find things she likes. Ah, also try sprinkling crumbled freeze dried chicken or salmon treats on the food, we call it kitty crack it is so appealing to them. or Fortiflora (see Dr Lisa'a articles for details on this , this post is getting rather long)

For the constipation canned helps, also add a tablespoon of water to the canned food. Also Miralax is safe to use for cats, very gentle. 1/8th to 1/4 tsp mixed in the food once or twice a day.
 
Phoebe_Rusty_Tiggy_Norton said:
If you use human syringes, you can get them for cheaper price than the pet ones -- but you would need to convert because the pet insulin is dilute compared to human insulin.
U40 (Prozinc) means there are 40 units of insulin in 1 cc (1 milliliter)of liquid
U100 (Lantus/Levemir) means there are 100 units of insulin in 1cc of liquid.
Click to expand...

To clairfy for newbies, "Human syringes" are U100 insulin syringes. You can use these to measure your cat's insulin, wheter it's U100 insulin or U40 insulin.

U40 insulin and U40 insulin syringes are made for pets only. Downside to U40 insulin syringes is that they only come in one gauge (29, I think) and they are more expensive than U100 insulin syringes and you can't easily measure tiny amounts of insulin.

Phoebe_Rusty_Tiggy_Norton said:
So.... you can buy 100 syringes for $17.49 from Hocks.com (for Monoject 31ga U100 3/10cc with half unit markings)
but you need to multiply your dose by 2.5
Click to expand...

Those same insulin syringes are $15.89 at AmericanDiabetesWholesale.com: http://www.americandiabeteswholesale.co ... Detail.bok They don't have half unit markings but the 30 gauge ones do and are only $14.89: http://www.americandiabeteswholesale.co ... Detail.bok A cat can't tell the minute difference between a 30 gauge needle and a 31 gauge needle.

Link to handy dose conversion chart: http://felinediabetes.com/insulin-conversions.htm
 
Thanks All - I did some testing today. 6 hour reading was 227, 8 hour was 230 and PMPS was 193. Going to give her only 1 unit tonight and tomorrow until I can do a full curve on Sunday. She ate so good tonight and is already walking behind me and meowing like she used to. I also picked up the makings of a hypo kit and you all were right...Wal-Mart is about $4 less for Fancy Feast!

More to come tomorrow!
 
Great on the home testing and welcome to the Vampire Club!!
Sounds like you are jumping in with both feet, good for you!
When you get a chance you might want to set up a spreadsheet and link it to your profile so we all can see the numbers you are getting which will help us help you.

There are some very good directions to how to get it all done in the Tech forum.

Mel
 
jen it's unusual for your pmps to be lower than your +6 or +8. it is possible that your cat was still on his way down. if you happen to get a number in the morning under 200, you can reduce you 1U to 1/2 U until we see more data.
I think I told you that the insulin peaks at 4-8 hours after shot...so you can see why this is an unusual number.
will be interested in your coming #'s this weekend.
 
actually since you shoot so early (5pm) could you get a +4 or +5 tonight?
curves are called curves becuase they should look like a curve, on PZI a U curve...today from what we got so far it looks like a line....downward.
 
Ann & Tess said:
I too have a bunch of U40 syringes you can have, I just haven't gotten around to offering them to the Newbie kits. It often seems like they don't need them, most of us use the U100, easier to measure micro doses. My ex-vet charged even more than yours did and I'd like to see someone get good use from them.
Click to expand...

Good grief! My vet only charged approximately 13.00 for 100 u40 syringes.

So I was shocked when Jen's vet paid over $30.00 and then your vet charged even more. Highway robbery!
 
I ended up giving her the 2 units tonight because I was unsure whether I should lower it for one dose if I didn't lower it this morning. And I just got home about 15 mins ago and she was crying so I gave them the remainder of their food from what she ate before her second dose to eat and she ate about 1/4 more and then I put it up. I read some people give their cats 3 feedings a day so I thought that was ok. Am I wrong? Well because she just ate it seems silly for me to do a +4 or +5 so I will do the AMPS and PMPS tomorrow and a full curve on Sunday and will add 2 additional tests 2 hrs after her 2nd dose and another 2 hours after that.

I will say she is looking and acting more like her old self (not too much, but at least more than she had) and her eyes are healing nicely from the uveitus.
 
good for you for home testing!! way to go to get all the supplies and follow the advice here. I have found the advice to be invaluable-without it I would have been broke and had to make the horrible decision many pet owners face. My Khan had lost over 6# so I feed him all day long Fancy Feast -grain free off Binky's list. Walmart is the cheapest I found. I personally don't like to support Walmart if I can help it so I bought a meter from Target but hey the price is about the same as for the strips.

To date because of this board my cat Khan has been switched to Lantus.. I purchased 5 lantus pens from Canada pharmacy.. for $107 including shipping.. look in supply cabinet. If you lived by me I'd be happy to sell a pen to you since 1u 1 -2 times a day -pen will last a long time. I bought syringes from Walgreens but I'm sure I can get it cheaper elsewhere. I'm in the midwest if there were a way to ship out the insulin to you I would- but really someone here would have to tell me exactly how in order to NOT spoil the insulin during shipping and temperature variance.

I've also checked out catinfo.org to learn more about litter and types of litter boxes since Khan was peeing outside the box. Prior to this I bought the the cheap Family Dollar $3.65 all included disposable box.. I think it is called "kitty.something".. well I placed this on top of a plastic container lid. Khan was able to step in easily and pee.. that stopped the peeing on the floor. I'm now in the process of followng the catinfo.org recommendations on litter/litter box types/placement guidelines since I have 5 cats-4 are senior all with health issues.. peeing in my house I've had it with it. REally want to spend my time on the health issues and not cleaning up urine messes and dumping litter/shopping for litter etc.. I'm convinced I can save money if I follow Dr. Pierson's advice on catinfo.org site. I've even gone so far as covered my couches with a "silo black cover" purchased at fleet farm (under$10) and slid the couch in and duct taped the black garbage bag material onthe underside, placed sheets over the couch/tucked it in then placed a blanket over the top. It has worked FANTASTIC along with following the catinfo.org recommendations. yes doesn't look the best of the best..but not too bad either with pillows. At least this way I know clean up is easy for cat hair/pee (if it happens) and my 3yr old doesn't have to lay on cat hair-since I place a clean sheet down every day---easy to do one load of wash per day of cat sheets/bed covers compared to vacuuming -since I don't have a strong enough vacuum to suck up all that cat hair..most of my cats are long haired!

Good luck! you are doing fantastic!!
 
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