Newly diagnosed diabetic cat, questioning 1st home blood sugar reading?

[fenderrae]

My 12-year-old longhair cat Ducky was urinating and drinking water a little more than usual for a few weeks but everything else seemed normal. It seemed to be getting a little better but I brought her in to the vet to run some blood tests just to be cautious. As a note, she is EXTREMELY afraid of the vets and has to be given gabapentin beforehand and even then she'll be growling and freaking out the whole time.

They gave me a call and said she's diabetic. They had me come in the next day to learn how to give insulin, but said I didn't need to worry about having my own glucose monitor or anything yet and that after administering insulin for a week and a half we would check up on her at the vet. They didn't give me a copy of her blood results or anything, but I just did not feel comfortable blindly giving her insulin without checking first so I bought an Alphatrak glucose monitor to try and see if it was a lower level at home.

I haven't administered any insulin yet, and took a prick from her ear 12 hours after eating anything to test for the first time and got a reading of 188. Definitely higher than it should be and I'm sure it could be a little inaccurate but is this high enough that would need insulin? It seems like 250 is the threshold. I know it can spike after eating, but everywhere seems to say to check blood sugar before eating, did I get the timing wrong? I'm just super paranoid that she'll get hypoglycaemic especially because i know that stress and anxiety at the vets can throw off blood sugar levels and I don't even know what tests they ran. I'll call my vet tomorrow for more info, but basically would appreciate any input from other people that have dealt with this before.

Thanks

 

[fenderrae]

***sorry mean to say shorthair, not longhair!

 

[fionasmom]

Feline Diabetes Message Board - FDMB

Join this group as soon as you can. They are a wonderful source for all your specific questions about diabetic cats and are highly responsible about answering questions. As you move deeper into managing diabetes for your cat, they can help with the fine points which may arise.

I have had two diabetic cats; one years ago and one recently. Both lived into old age with the condition and I did administer daily insulin to them. The last cat used ProZinc and I was happy with that insulin. I did not monitor at home as both cats were rescued adult ferals who allowed the injection but would not have allowed more handling. The FDMB will encourage monitoring however. It was easier to take my cats regularly to the vet for their checks which my vet was fine with doing. Certainly I think that you should do all for your cat that he will allow. You also need more information from your vet, as you say, which includes all those questions you have about what was run, monitoring if you choose to do that, exact time of administration of the insulin daily, etc.

 

[LTS3]

I haven't administered any insulin yet, and took a prick from her ear 12 hours after eating anything to test for the first time and got a reading of 188. Definitely higher than it should be and I'm sure it could be a little inaccurate but is this high enough that would need insulin?

Ask your vet what a safe "no insulin" cut off number is for your cat. Generally it is 150 mg/dl or less for new diabetics to prevent a possible hypoglycemic episode. Normal blood glucose level is roughly 60 mg/dl to 150mg/dl in cats.

The typical routine is test, feed, give insulin. It varies slightly depending on the insulin. For a gentle insulin such as Lantus, you can test, feed, and give insulin all within a few minutes. For harsher insulins such as Humulin N, you test, feed, wait half an hour or so, then give insulin. Having food in the tummy softens the effect of the harsh insulin. What insulin did your vet prescribe?

You should consider having a back up Human blood glucose meter and supplies on hand. You can buy test strips at any pharmacy whereas the Alpha Track test strips aren't sold in stores so you have to wait for more to arrive and shipping anything these days takes a long time.

Feline Diabetes Message Board - FDMB

Join this group as soon as you can. They are a wonderful source for all your specific questions about diabetic cats and are highly responsible about answering questions. As you move deeper into managing diabetes for your cat, they can help with the fine points which may arise.

You're welcome to continue posting about general all things cats here on TCS but you won't get much help with the diabetes. It's just not discussed in depth like it is on the FDMB board.