Does anyone giving insulin shots to your pet use your own meter to check the dog's? I wonder if this can be done, what level would we be looking for and if the dog ever forgives you for poking him. where to poke? ear?
Ouch!
Our neighbour's doggie has Diabetes. Dawn gets one shot a day, down from 2. She also is allergic to chicken. I gave her one of my meters with 10 strips and lancets plus a sharps container last year when she was dxd. She does poke Dawn's big ears. They forgive and forget...'til the next time.
Dawn's sugars were up at 24-28mmol/l when she was dxd., poor Girl. But now her numbers are down. She's been as low as 4.5 but the Vet wants her to keep it somewhat higher like 5.5 - 7.8 when possible.
Lucky we have a neighbour dog with Diabetes. One day around 10:30 pm, I went to get my last box of strips, then I remembered that my Hubby had forgoten to pick them up on the way home from our Friend's place and our Pharmacy was closed. Darn! Our insurance covers my strips but even so, I didn't feel like spending $85. for a box of strips at a 24 hr. pharmacy.
So I phoned my neighbour and asked if I could borrow 8 of her doggies strips. I felt silly but we both laughed about it and she was happy to give the help back to me. :)
This video at youtube shows how to do it for cats, on the outer vein in their ear. I tried this with my cats but wiz was not allowing it and I couldn't get enough blood. They don't have D but I wanted to see what their levels are.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J49mi-RtTdE
It's similar for Dogs... this woman says you can do other areas too but she prefers the ear. His bg was really high imo- 267. I'm not sure what normal dog bg levels are but cat's bg levels are similar to people except when they have stress in preparation for fighting etc. they can go sky high very quickly and then drop back down and it's normal for them.
i dont know about the levels and checking, but my aunts lab is diabetic and my aunt says "insulin time, brandy" and the dog lays down on her back and just lets my aunt give her the shot. such an angel!
lol.. that is so cute.. I tried again and last night I managed to test both my cats bg: wiz = 75 sybil = 69...
I found that warming their ear with a hot cloth first helped a lot.
I'm going to get my old dog tested at the vet tomorrow because she is tired all the time and drinks a lot of water. If she is positive for diabetes, I do hope I have a way to moniter it. I don't want to have to order any special meters if my own will do.
save your self lots of money and just checks your dogs urine if you want to know if he is diabetic. Get a urine strip and have him pee on it. A dog glucose level is close to humans 80-115 is the official "any breed" level.
Red blood cells in dogs and cats are much smaller than in humans. This can throw off the finger sticks.
I used to use the old color tape that we used to use for blood testing way back when for my dog. I would swab his tounge, and I sorta guessed how much insulin he needed. It worked relatively well.
for anyone wondering, my old dog did not test positive for diabetes, she just had a raging infection of her gums. Perking up now that she's been on antibiotics.
That is great! I'm glad she doesn't have D. I feel the ear test is pretty reliable because many people whose cats and dogs are on insulin do that so I will keep doing it occasionally and have the yearly or bi yearly bloodwork at dvm. I have my cats on a no grain, no carb diet which is what all cats and dogs should be on, they only need a few leafy veggies here and there- I tried mine on a raw diet but they weren't thrilled with that. I may try again soon and see how they feel about it. Many dvm say no dry food and I agree with that too. In cats with D they found putting them on nocarb diets reverses all D symptoms in most cases.