Forum for Type 1 diabetic dogs

[TeslaJooni]

Woof and a waggy tail to you and your dog from me and mine. He is not diabetic but get to be if I keep feeding him eggy bread...
Hope you find your site though I am sure many things that are good for humans are good for dogs too (healthy fats, good fresh meats/offal and some oily fish).

Thanks

 

[TeslaJooni]

I lost mine last year. If I knew then what I know now I would have switched him straight on to raw feeding.

If you get your insulin on line, half the price of vets, check the carrier they use. I used to use violet then they changed their courier, disastrous. I found another firm that used DPD.

Sorry for your loss! I can't think of losing mine

 

[Marie 2]

My dog is only about 7 years old, so I hope she is around for a while. I'm pretty sure she got it because of steroids she was put on because of a inability to digest proteins right and food allergies. This is a rescue that had been pretty abused. She has to stay on steroids for her stomach and that doesn't help with her diabetes and is probably part of the issue with her numbers being erratic some of the time.

I have to do the conversions, but I originally was aiming for 8-11 mmol, but she has these extreme rises and drops and it was difficult. So while we still aim for 8-11, we are happy at 11-15. Once she is past 15 we give her a correction dose of Humalog.
This could really vary per dog but I use 1 unit for every 50-100 point drop I need.

We will let her go up to 15-16 if it is within 2 maybe 3 hours of eating and then starts dropping. But if she hits 20 ish I always give her some Humalog no matter when that is. We have been known to give it to her in the middle of the night.

My original vet internist said to aim for 7-8. But she drops and we just had a hard time aiming for that without her going too low. We have since moved and the vet I have now pretty much doesn't say a word about it, She was delighted I wanted to put on a LIbre as she had heard about it but never seen one. She is estatic if she stays mostly in the 11-15 range. I think my vet knows I probably know more about diabetes than she does, but she knows about dogs more than me so.............

Please read my numbers carefully as I had to use a conversion calculator to have your UK numbers.

I will try to screenshot a couple of graphs.

 

[Marie 2]

I couldn't figure out how to make it smaller..............

She has been on a pattern for about 5 days of needing extra again.

But this is a good day, she did spike some right before breakfast, we gave her 2 units of Humalog with her normal breakfast 20 units Novolin N dose. But you'll notice she was okay at night and she gets less insulin at night.

Units of Novolin N and Humalog are different than the U40 insulins and are not equal measures. We use U 100 syringes for U 100 insulins.

 

[Marie 2]

A conversion calculator
https://www.diabetes.co.uk/blood-sugar-converter.html

 

[Marie 2]

A bad day, we gave a few corrections and she still never got in a good range

 

[Marie 2]

This shows the last 7 day patterns, her average is 14.2

 

[Marie 2]

I am not thrilled about my dogs numbers, but I am happier we are keeping her more steady now??? But I noticed with these last 7 days we aren't getting her as low as we would like. I am used to at least more 11's in her readings. But that is probably connected with the fact we have even been having additionally to give her some Humalog every day. Her outside allergies are acting up so I am wondering if that is what the issue is right now with some high averages. We probably need a little stronger corrections right now.

Before we had her bad teeth removed, I think she probably had near the same average but it was a lot of peaks and valleys on a constant basis. And she was using a lot more insulin too. It drove me totally nuts.

 

[TeslaJooni]

@TeslaJooni
Hi! I actually use Humalog to lower my dogs when needed. But my dog is a larger dog so it's easier. (Doberman) And I'm a type 1 so I am familiar with insulin obviously. You have to be very careful about using Humalog and most vets aren't familiar with it. I put a Libre on her so I could keep track of her blood sugars easier.

She has always been very erratic and getting some bad teeth pulled did help a lot. But she still has days where she goes high and we have her on Novolin N but can't increase the daily dose because it's not an everyday thing. So the Humalog is extremely useful. I keep the Libre on my dog with Skin Tac.

I know some prefer Novolin N to Vetsulin.

There is a site that has some people very helpful with suggestions on Facebook called Diabetic Dog Owners. The moderators can be a little conservative on treatments, but many people will pipe in with experience or ideas usually. There are some very knowledgeable people there. It's where I found out people were putting Libres on their dog.

She was diagnosed in 2018 and had DKA and was hospitalized for several days. I actually asked to take her home so I could deal with figuring out the amounts needed and knew I could use Humalog to bring down her levels faster.

Hi Marie 2
Just wondering if you prescribe dosage and the type of insulin yourself or under instruction of your vet. We just follow the vet's directions to the dot and we're kind of stuck with extremely high glucose level. The vet says she can't increase the dosage because it's already at the max. But I'm not happy. I'm sure there must be a solution somewhere! I'm thinking of taking him to a endocrinologist, not sure if there'll be any improvement.

 

[Marie 2]

Except for an original starting point, I have always decided on the dose for my dog. But I am a type 1and that helps.

 

[Antje77]

The vet says she can't increase the dosage because it's already at the max. But I'm not happy. I'm sure there must be a solution somewhere! I'm thinking of taking him to a endocrinologist, not sure if there'll be any improvement.

What about a second opinion? As far as I know insulin doesn't have a maximum dose...

 

[Frankiex]

Hi,
Would someone please guide to a forum for type 1 diabetic dogs

Hi. My dog is newly diagnosed type 1 diabetes. She is nearly 7 and doing really well. I’m a bit confused on how much food she needs. She is fed twice a day 12 hrs apart

 

[Marie 2]

If she is doing well, you are doing the right thing. But doing well can be subjective vet to vet. There is a huge variance in treatment and what numbers are good to them. Mostly they don't want them to drop too low and a dog can't tell you so that's extremely important and most important. I don't know of a forum, but that could have changed in the last few years. There are about 3 US FB pages for diabetic dogs, they really vary in quality. Message me if you want more information about it.

The biggest thing that was helpful for me was putting a Libre on her. Nowadays the Libres have alerts which is even better. I used different tech with the Libre for the alerts when I had her. My dog's BG level could really fluctuate and I sort of believe that her being put on a steroid for life for a stomach issue is probably what caused it and caused her fluctuations. So knowing when her numbers would go up or drop more than usual 24/7 was a real blessing. My phone worked as a reader for it. More and more people are using Libres now and a lot of vets in the US are recommending them and they are even spreading the word at their meetings. I still had to test, the LIbre can be off, especially for a dog. But to know that her numbers were dropping allowed me to know when to test in case she was dropping too much or if she was going too high so I could make corrections. My dog never went blind which is common because of cataracts developing because so many dogs are kept at such high numbers. You can usually have cataract surgery done if that happens. You'd be surprised at how much information when you can see their numbers 24/7. A lot of owners use Libres and love them like me, but there are some against it as being inaccurate, you will run across both online on the sites. Vets here often recommend them now. They can be inaccurate, but it can be inaccurate on a person too and you are not testing a dog all day long and it gives you a a graph to show what the whole day's levels trends are doing. You should still test, so you know or if you question the level. But they do have to be self funded. You can get them for $37 each in the US. I think that's about 35 Euros or 30 British pounds???? They last 14 days. You can also get special "pet meters" that are considered more accurate (usually) than using a people one. Some of it will depend on your budget ability but I am a firm beleiver in the more information you have, the better.

She passed and it was heartbreaking. We were type 1's together. She was my velcro and had anxiety issues so she went everywhere with us. I don't know why she died, she died after surgery that the vet recommended that wasn't diabetes related.