Angel Mochi December 2020

[Lchow022]

Help!! Really really high blood sugar!!!

Mochi's blood sugar seemed like it was getting better since we raised the dose of insulin to 4.75 instead of 4.5. I'm not sure if he is having a rebound affect or if its the new supplement hes taking for his arthritis.
The past 3 days his blood sugar seemed good!
Last few numbers I took was on Sunday:

12pm:22 (400mg)
2pm: went for a walk and dropped to 14.2 (255mg)
4pm: 8.2 (150mg)
6pm:right before food and insulin 4 (75mg)

He barely drank any water the past two days and had a lot of energy so I knew his blood sugar was good.


Today I came home from work around 7:30pm (I and a half hour after insulin) and I noticed a bunch of water was missing! I thought someone spilt his water but it was mochi that drank it all! I took his blood sugar and it was up at 37.8 (666mg)!!! This is the highest he's ever been since he became a diabetic!
I quickly took him out for a walk with my dad in the rain and came back by 8pm. His blood sugar dropped down to 23.8 (430). But now I'm just so confused what is happening..
Could it be the new flexadin advanced UC II he's taking or is it a rebound affect???

What should I do next???

[Lchow022]

Re: Help!! Really really high blood sugar!!!

I just checked his blood sugar again 1 1/2 hour after his walk and drop and it's still at 24 (430mg)...

So does that mean it is not a rebound affect?

I'm so lost...

[jesse girl]

Re: Help!! Really really high blood sugar!!!

rebound is a possibility with numbers dropping the way they did but you should see the high levels drop back down in a few days from the event occurring . If it stays high then something else has changed in the short term . I usually lean to an infection as a change to higher numbers

[Raysaint]

Re: Help!! Really really high blood sugar!!!

I'd guess rebound. The body can still be adjusting to the extra insulin. And if a fasting is at 4.0, that's about when the body might decide to protect itself and release sugar reserves.
Happens to many dogs including mine.
The good news is that rebounds usually recover quicker than high sugar caused by food.

[Lchow022]

Re: Help!! Really really high blood sugar!!!

I hope it's my dad administering his insulin poorly yesterday. Or he ate something my baby niece dropped or it might be from the new glucosamine.
I have no idea...but his fasting number this morning was still high

6am right before food and insulin : 22 (400mg)
6:30am right after food and insulin ans came back from a short walk: 18 (325mg)
9:30am: 14.2 (255mg)

I'm hoping that it continues to drop but his usual numbers are high during midday and then would drop back down during fasting.

I was wondering if there are diabetic vet specialists?
My vet tech friend said mochi should see one and see if they can find an insulin that works better than Humilin N for him. She thinks mochis blood sugar jumps around too much. My vet however thinks as long as the insulin brings his numbers down within the day it's good because there will never be perfect consistency.

[Lchow022]

Re: Help!! Really really high blood sugar!!!

I dont think it is a rebound anymore after checking his fasting number. I hope it's my dad administering his insulin poorly yesterday. Or he ate something my baby niece dropped or it might be from the new glucosamine.
I have no idea...but his fasting number this morning was still high

6am right before food and insulin : 22 (400mg)
6:30am right after food and insulin ans came back from a short walk: 18 (325mg)
9:30am: 14.2 (255mg)

I'm hoping that it continues to drop but his usual numbers are high during midday and then would drop back down during fasting.

I was wondering if there are diabetic vet specialists?
My vet tech friend said mochi should see one and see if they can find an insulin that works better than Humilin N for him. She thinks mochis blood sugar jumps around too much. My vet however thinks as long as the insulin brings his numbers down within the day it's good because there will never be perfect consistency.

[jesse girl]

Re: Help!! Really really high blood sugar!!!

There are specialist but probably not specific to diabetes . My personal opinion all of the insulin that can be used for dogs is not completely appropriate . There are very few dogs if any that get really good blood sugar I have only seen one on the forum and it created problems for jesse and me because I thought that was possible and we did get there at times but could never hold it and it made me a bit nuts

Jesse goes though so many ins and outs that if I reacted to everything we would be someplace else today and me in the loony bin

Small dogs can be more difficult as doses can be small and small variations can have a big affect . They also are a bit more hyper which can use up insulin faster than a calmer larger dog

You appear to be using walks to lower sugar and that does work but its just short term response . Kind of like using a fast acting insulin and its probably better than staying high for most of the day . There was a member who exclusively used walks to keep their dog in a better range and did well for them . Not so much for jesse when I tried something like that early in jesses diagnosis .

There is not allot of options for injected insulin .Vetsulin and NPH and I think most dogs have a similar response to both . Levemir is only useful for larger dogs with higher doses as this insulin is 4 times more potent than the other 2 . Lantus from what I have seen has not had good results in dogs

You could experiment with diet to see if you could match things up better with insulin but thats a trial and era process and it can have digestive issues changing things up

I wish there was a easy solution but I have to say almost 10 years into this . I still am perplexed and I dont think any vet has put the time in that i have in this specific disease . The good thing you dont have to be perfect and not even close for dogs to do quite well

If I was a vet I would not specialized in diabetes . To much time involved with so so results . I think you would have allot of unhappy clients you would have to deal with

Maybe in the future they will develop an insulin more appropriate for dogs but at this time there does not seem to be much interest in that

[Lchow022]

Re: Help!! Really really high blood sugar!!!

Thank you for letting me know Jesse girl. I feel like the past 4 years has driven me to a bit of anxiety and depression. Mochi's blood sugar today seems better than yesterday. I'll try and take him out for walks twice a day. We took him out quite a bit today just to see if his sugars will drop. I was able to go to work for 4 hours and come back to check on his sugars before his dinner and insulin shot.

Today's curve seemed stable but didn't drop as much as I would've liked:

6am right before food and insulin : 22 (400mg)
6:30am right after food and insulin ans came back from a short walk: 18 (325mg)
9:30am: 14.2 (255mg)
12pm: 15.7 (280mg)
Went for a super short walk in the rain..
12:30pm: 13.7 (245mg)
6pm right before food and insulin: 11.9 (215mg)

I have a question for everyone...
How many times have you upped the dose of insulin in the last few years?
Mochi seems like he needs more insulin again...he has been on 4.5 units of insulin for the past 2 years and seems like he needs up to 5 units now. Is it normal to up the dosage?

[jesse girl]

Re: Help!! Really really high blood sugar!!!

Jesses timeline is a bit longer and she has needed a bit more insulin over the last year . Maybe a half unit to a unit total for the day . I cant give a dose amount because her routine doesnt follow the norm of most .She went many many years without racing the dose and sometimes lowering it . I would think as they get older they would need less but once again My logic isnt working for jesse . She has her own book

[Raysaint]

Re: Help!! Really really high blood sugar!!!

Jesse makes 2 key points.

"Jesse goes though so many ins and outs that if I reacted to everything we would be someplace else today and me in the loony bin."

"The good thing is you dont have to be perfect and not even close for dogs to do quite well"

If you expect consistent numbers or sugar behaviour from now until eternity, that's not diabetes. As I mentioned, my dog goes thru many periods of number changes, it can be for a week, then back to normal. I don't worry at all.

The insulin is working, your dog is going thru a bowl type curve range, and probably in a few days, fastings will be lower/normal, and that means the whole 12 hour range should be lower.

If fastings stay high, then possibly he might need a slight increase. That's normal in diabetes. I've upped my dog's dose a couple times in the last year.

[Lchow022]

Re: Help!! Really really high blood sugar!!!

Thank you Jesse and ray saint. If there wasn't this k9 diabetes site forum I would've gone crazy by now.

Mochi's having another crazy episode today of high blood sugar and drinking a lot of water...I dont understand why he's having these bumps way more frequently than usual...
My dad said he decided to give mochi 5 units of insulin for dinner because he noticed mochis excessive amount of drinking today. He's been getting 4.75units the past 2 weeks and today hes up to 5 units...I'm worried now...and not sure why he would constantly get bumps so often. He has been getting more boiled chicken through out the day to get him to do his rehab exercises.. but boiled chicken never causes his blood sugar to go up.

His blood sugar was pretty good during the weekend and two days ago it was pretty good as well. Today I got home at 7:30pm (1 1/2 hour after his food and insulin) and it was at 31.5mmol (570mg)....then my dad and I took him for a walk and came back around 7:45 and it dropped to 21.7mmol (390 mg). I'm not sure what we're doing wrong and what to do to stop having so many hiccup days..

[Raysaint]

Re: Help!! Really really high blood sugar!!!

You're probably not doing anything wrong. Every dog is different and some will have more hiccup days than others. The fact that he has good days indicates there's probably not a major issue at play.

I test and record morning fasting every day. I mark every day that his fasting is higher than I like. He averages 6 of those a month. That's 20%.
So 80% of his days start out not bad. I'm happy.

[Lchow022]

Should I reduce his amount of insulin?

Mochi has been receiving around 5 units of insulin during December. His blood sugar seemed to have been getting better and stayed pretty well throughout the day.
However I'm not sure if he's starting to have a rebound affect..can it happen anytime of the day? His water intakes been very good and consistent but the numbers are just a little odd. Last week when I did a small curve it seemed to be quite odd:

Jan 12th curve:
12pm-18mmol (320mg)
2:30pm- 23mmol (410mg)
6pm (right before food and insulin)- 10.2mmol (185mg)
7:45pm (right after a walk)-3.7mmol (67mg)

Today I was only able to take 3 numbers due to work but it was similar:
6am(right before food and insulin): 18mmol (320mg)
6pm(right before food and insulin):13mmol (235mg)
7:30pm(after walk): 3.5mmol (63mg)

Is that indicating that I'm giving too much insulin?

[Raysaint]

Re: Should I reduce his amount of insulin?

Seems a bit strange. Humulin has no rapid action, so dropping so much soon after eating is odd to me. Are you giving any food/treats when you see the low number?

Riley had a weird curve for a while where he stayed flat for 3 hours after eating, then dropped a bit, then had a big spike. It changed back to a bowl curve months later.

[jesse girl]

Re: Should I reduce his amount of insulin?

The walk may have accelerated the drop . exercise will do that

mochi may need a sugar boost before the walk . I use to give jesse a spoonful of honey before her walk

food doesnt turn to sugar fast enough from what I have seen with jesse that is why I used honey

The honey got jesse about a half hour boost and then it was used up . over time jesses did not need the honey boost

so you can experiment to see if you can reduce that drop after walk