NansPups - Zoe with her odd curve

[Nan's Pups]

Merging two threads

[Nan's Pups]

Hi all, this is the old "Nan's Pups" who has 2 diabetic dogs on hand, well, now 3. I have been managing MJ and Oliver's diabetes from 2014. I can't get a reset password email sent, not sure why, so I had to register a new account.

A little history: MJ and Oliver are brothers, Rat Terriers, they were both diagnosed with diabetes in 2014 at age of 6, 3 months apart. They are very well regulated on a diet of mixture Wysong Epgen and cooked lentils. MJ is neutered male, Oliver is intact male. On Novolin-N.

Zoe is 12 yrs of age and was diagnosed on 14th of May. She's spayed female, 23lbs, and she's MJ and Oliver's mother. I thought I had extensive experiences in regulating canine diabetes, but seem having trouble to figure out what's going on with Zoe. Today I did her first curve, it looks like insulin is not working. She's receiving Novolin-N 5.5U/12hr. Meal time 7am / 7pm.

During the last 2 weeks, I also spot testing her BG at Nadir time, 1pm to 3pm. It's very very odd. The first few days she seemed to have good response to insulin, and then Nadir reading just kept rising.

[k9diabetes]

The insulin is working - she just has a “mountain” curve instead of a valley. I actually really like mountain curves because lowest blood sugar occurs at mealtime and you don’t have to worry about low blood sugar in between.

It would be good to try to flatten it some. Maybe replace part of the meal with something merging more rapidly digested and see if that helps. It takes some experimentation to see if the insulin is absorbed late or if the food is doing heated slowly and the peak midday is coming from sugar going into the bloodstream hours after the meal and injection.

[Nan's Pups]

Originally Posted by k9diabetes

The insulin is working - she just has a “mountain” curve instead of a valley. I actually really like mountain curves because lowest blood sugar occurs at mealtime and you don’t have to worry about low blood sugar in between.

It would be good to try to flatten it some. Maybe replace part of the meal with something merging more rapidly digested and see if that helps. It takes some experimentation to see if the insulin is absorbed late or if the food is doing heated slowly and the peak midday is coming from sugar going into the bloodstream hours after the meal and injection.

I use my own recipe of mixture of food which I am kind of proud of and it's been doing great with MJ and Oliver. Their BG never spike up after eating 2 to 4 hours. I am guess it's the "low carb" and "high fiber" are at work. However, the recipe is not working exactly the same with Zoe. You know what worries me the most? It's she would have a not so bad reading of BG, such as 179, at 1pm 4 days after being on insulin, and then the number just kept climbing. The insulin has been increase 0.5U, and the same thing happened.

BTW, when she was diagnosed, the vet said she had UTI in present because there are small blood clots in her urine (that's the reason I brought her to the vet, actually didn't notice much excessive drinking or urination). Her blood work came out all normal, but high BG. She's on antibiotic for 10 days(no refill), but I notice she still licks her lady part a lot. Wondering if UTI is till there.

[Raysaint]

My dog changed to a curve similar to that. His thyroid was a little high, so I figured that was the reason. Thyroid is back to normal, and curve stayed like that, with flat sugars after eating and then a big rise around noon, when insulin is starting to strengthen.
Spot check yesterday showed a big rise after eating, so maybe he's going back to a bowl curve. I have to do more spot checks.
But this shows that curve patterns do change. Not sure why, but a few tweaks here and there can usually bring results back to satisfactory numbers within each 12 hour period.

[jesse girl]

welcome back and glad things have been going well with your other diabetic pups .

Wow 3 diabetic dogs at one time . That has to be a record . Tami had 2 .

The problem maybe the UTI as infections are notorious for affecting blood sugar
and sometime knowing when that has cleared can be difficult to determine

I kind of lean to females maybe a bit more difficult to regulate even with a spay its possible there are still hormones present to cause some havoc and UTIs are more common in females

[Nan's Pups]

I am worried about her turning blind. If this continues, I will bring her back to the vet. The vet is not really keen on finding things out, not I am complaining, I like the vet, he probably thinks I already knew so much that he doesn't have to educate me any further.

I am worried about after increase insulin, I see a pattern it takes slight effect for the initial few days and then all go back up to the 300 again. That's why at the first, when I post the curve image, I suspected the insulin is not working on her.

Fortunately, for me, it's easy to rule out if insulin has turned bad, I have more than 1 diabetic dogs, I test them all together, when I see one having high number and the other doesn't, I know the insulin is fine.

[Nan's Pups]

Originally Posted by jesse girl

welcome back and glad things have been going well with your other diabetic pups .

Wow 3 diabetic dogs at one time . That has to be a record . Tami had 2 .

The problem maybe the UTI as infections are notorious for affecting blood sugar
and sometime knowing when that has cleared can be difficult to determine

I kind of lean to females maybe a bit more difficult to regulate even with a spay its possible there are still hormones present to cause some havoc and UTIs are more common in females

If she does still have UTI, what we should see in urine analysis and blood work? According to the vet, everything looks fine. He though the numbers on liver and kidney might be escalated due to being diabetic, however those number came out fine as well.

[jesse girl]

well you might be able to add a short or fast acting insulin like r if you see the run up after feeding . Now this may just be a temporary situation until the possible infection clears

I have used this method with jesse on occasion when needed to control periods of higher sugar . Now you have to be careful if something was causing higher sugar and that has cleared the faster acting insulin will need to be removed

you may also need to reduce the N insulin with the addition of R

Some people use it as a permanent solution to a rise in sugar after feeding and shot with good results

I have also seen raising insulin and seeing good results then turning not so good after a couple days . For my jesse she only can handle so much insulin at one time and reacts to more than that dose . Now like i said Zoes problem maybe temporary do to infection and raising may make it worse

As far as eyesight i had a thought that the prescription foods may make a dog more prone to cataracts . Now i have no scientific knowledge and professionals may say i am nuts and maybe i am but what i seen on the forum over the years i think its worth bringing up . My jesse ate one can of WD and that was it and has been on homemade since . She has been diabetic for over 8 years and has kept her sight ( knock on wood ) she has not had perfect blood sugar but adequate and her sugar was very high for weeks in the beginning . So there has to be a reason and we are seeing more dogs keeping there sight and for a longer time from what i seen here years ago . the big difference many people have decided to pass on the prescription diets . Now those diets have worked well for controlling blood sugar so i dont discount them for there benefits they do have . Another big factor has been testing blood sugar at home

just a thought

[Nan's Pups]

If it's necessary or permanent solution I will add R, however I think, in my opinion, there's something going on that prevents her from absorbing the insulin like she should. It's not possible for the BG to rise over 300 within interaction of insulin with my feeding recipe. For MJ and Oliver from time to time I had to add carbs in meals just to compensate the slow rising after meals.

I use cooked lentil with coconut oil, Wysong Epgon Canine/Feline, amount varies for each dog. BGs on boys never never rise up sky high after meals, well they did when MJ was on the Royal Canin.

It's not like I am lazy, just I have to manage 3, that's 6 shorts and 6 meals a day, I am trying not to get things too complicated. I still have another 2 healthy ones to take care, between whom one is deaf. And, didn't mention it, I rescued a litter of cats, now I have 3 of them on hands.