Tag: dogs

We Love Our Vet Crew!!!

Bennie snuggling with her favorite human, Dr. Brad Everson, during a recent visit.

When you get a life changing diagnosis like diabetes, initially you may be in a fog of sorts. Even as a (human) medical professional, the thought of taking care of a diabetic pet was unfathomable – there are so many differences between the care of humans and animals. Knowing you have an AMAZING vet to get you through this journey is key! Long before her diagnosis, Beignet formed a special bond with her vet, Dr. Brad Everson at Southern Hills Animal Hospital in Shreveport, LA ( http://www.sohillsvet.com ). She gets so incredibly excited when she realizes we’ve pulled up. She adores everyone on staff, but no one quite as much as her Dr. Brad. The joke amongst the staff is that Dr. Brad is her boyfriend😂. She will literally sneak out of an exam room to look for him in his private office if she doesn’t see or hear him. She will cry and moan if she hears him in the next room, completely jealous he’s in a room without her.

Bennie has spent quite a bit of time at Southern Hills since her diagnosis in January 2018. Even at her sickest, she is always happy to be there. If she spends the day, I don’t even get so much as a tail wag because she is never ready to leave. From the moment she walks in the door she has everyone from receptionists to everyone in the back, ready to give her tummy rubs. She’s also good at getting everyone in the waiting room to rub her tummy as well. We just can’t say enough about how much we love our vet team!!!

When it comes to having a diabetic pet, you need to think of yourself as part of a TEAM with your vet. Hopefully everyone has a vet like, Dr. Brad, that they can work seamlessly with. He is always patient, answering the LISTS of questions I bring in each visit. He encouraged me to home test, letting me know Bennie would be hopefully regulated far quicker and more accurately if I was willing to home test. Having had several diabetic pets himself, he empathized with our set feeding and insulin schedules. He has time and time again gone above and beyond for my sweet girl. He truly loves her as much as she loves him. He is typically on the floor rubbing her tummy or holding her while she showers him in doggy kisses while he fills me in on everything I need to know.

My advice for anyone going through this is to have a vet you can trust and work with. Don’t make changes to your pet’s care without consulting your vet. If you want to change insulin or other medications, discuss these changes with your vet as they may have reasons for the medications they have prescribed for your pet. Be patient. Your dog will not be regulated in days or weeks. If you don’t feel you are getting correct information get a second opinion or request to see an Internal Medicine specialist veterinarian. This may require you to travel. However, they typically will allow you to send them home testing results and blood glucose curves and give you advice between visits via phone or email. Plus I think the goal of most vets and vet specialists is to get you to the point that you are comfortable making your own insulin changes, etc if you home test. If you don’t home test, your vet will always manage your dosing based on your dog’s blood sugars in their office. Thankfully if needed, Southern Hills has an Internal Medicine Specialist, Dr Treadwell, on staff if we were to need her.

Just wanted to post this Ode to Dr. Brad! I can’t even list the ways he has gone over and above for us! He actually told me when Bennie was just 2yo that he suspected she would end up having IBD when she got older, so at least I was somewhat prepared for that diagnosis. We ❤️ the Southern Hills team and the quality of care we always know we will get! When my dogs went for their ProHeart shots, Dr. Brad’s newest partner, Dr. Tori Torres, saw us. She had taken the time to review Beignet’s whole chart when she saw us on her schedule so she would be up to date and prepared for any questions I might have on Bennie’s care which really impressed me! Another partner, Dr. Brown, discovered Bennie’s dry eye diagnosis. So thankful for our Southern Hills crew!! The best of the best!!!

-Devoted Doxie Mom

Bennie with Ms. Bonnie that runs the kennel area at Southern Hills. Bonnie always makes sure my diva gets extra spoiled on all the days she is sick enough to spend the day with Dr. Brad. And she always comes to our exam room to get her snuggles if we are just in for a quick visit. Bennie trying to tell Ashley to rub her tummy instead of posing for yet another pic.Bennie giving kisses to LJ, one of her many besties at Southern Hills.

Making sure she gives everyone a turn to give her some love!

Beignet does NOT like sharing snuggles with Andouille!

An Eye For An Eye….

Pictured above is our 3rd vet specialist selfie of 2018. Beignet and I just made our first 6 hour round trip visit to see Dr. John Warren at Veterinary Eye Institute in Plano, Texas (http://www.veterinaryeyeinstitute.com/meet-our-doctors/john-r-warren/ ). When Beignet got diagnosed with diabetes, all I could focus on was that she was only 7 years old and could soon be blind due to this diagnosis. Was she going to be able to beat diabetes? Of course I just assumed as a physician she would be the best controlled diabetic my vet has ever seen (and yes Bennie decided that wasn’t going to be the case…). Was her perfect control going to be soon enough to prevent diabetic cataracts? I sure hoped so.

The doctor in me immediately thought I needed to do all the preventative precautions for a diabetic. However we had a few obstacles. First there are very few vet specialists in our area. Secondly, Beignet threw me a major ball when she became extremely ill just weeks after her diagnosis. Worries over her eyes after a 6 week struggle for her life were just a distant memory.

Dr. Warren said it is always best to see a vet ophtho as soon as possible after a diabetes diagnosis. They can guide you through what to expect. Work with you on preventative care options. And also diagnose cataracts and other eye conditions that may already be present. Depending on the source, 50-70% of dogs diagnosed with diabetes develop cataracts during the first year after their diagnosis. Beignet has 4 more months until her 1 year anniversary so we hope that we beat those odds. However all diabetics will eventually get cataracts. My almost 12yo nondiabetic has early lenticular cataracts from old age now. My understanding is that diabetic cataracts respond better to surgery than nondiabetic cataracts, so at least there’s that if I can afford surgery when our time comes.

What I didn’t realize with my focus on cataracts was the next most common eye disorder in diabetics, Keratoconjunctivitis Sicca (aka dry eye). After a bout with corneal ulcers, Beignet received this new diagnosis weeks ago. Having the same diagnosis, I have some idea of what she’s been going through. However my dry eye doesn’t involved nasty snot pouring from my eyes all the time (thankfully). Beignet can at times not open her eyes. She blinks repetitively. I’m constantly having to clean her eyes and apply drops. If your diabetic dog has mucus discharge of any color from his/her eyes, please have your dog tested for dry eyes or better yet, see a vet eye doctor if you haven’t already. When Beignet saw Dr. Warren, she still had ZERO tear production in either eye. She has to do a month of once daily steroid drops along with a compounded 3 time a day immmunosuppressant drop that will hopefully stimulate tear production. If dogs fail therapy they can transplant a saliva gland from the mouth to the eye which causes nonstop tearing. We hope we don’t have to resort to this….

We will be traveling back to see Dr. Warren in a month. Please pray that her eyes are responding to treatment. We are feeling a little defeated at the moment. I keep thinking – what next?? Before 2018, we had minimal issues. So far, it’s been diabetes followed by chronic pancreatitis followed by suspected jejunal inflammatory bowel disease followed by a new heart murmur and now this. You can see with all that, why we aren’t the perfectly controlled diabetic I initially thought she would be (although is there even such a thing???). Her eye issues require more time than anything else. And for the record her heart issue was insignificant. Despite it all except for the 6 weeks in February/March and this past month this sweet baby has been nothing but happy no matter what she had to deal with. I’m hoping we get back to that fun loving, tummy rub obsessed, tail wagging, loves everyone happy girl again!

To end, my advice is even if you have to drive, get your dogs eyes checked! Even if you can’t afford cataract surgery, getting established might improve you dog’s long term outcomes. And what if your dog has treatable dry eye, like Bennie or another easily treatable condition? Not treating can lead to vision loss. I definitely don’t think a $125 visit was at all unreasonable especially in that it was the nicest vet office I’ve ever visited. Just wish he was a little closer!!!

~Devoted Doxie Mom

Addendum : A lot of diabetic dog owners go ahead and start lubricant eye drops when their dog is diagnosed to hopefully prevent their dog from getting dry and becoming more susceptible to corneal ulcers. Here is the type many use pictured above. Click on the pic to purchase.

Although it was recommended that Beignet not use just drops.   Instead, Dr. Warren insisted she use the GenTeal Tears Severe Gel (not to be confused with the version for nighttime that’s a step up from this which we were told not to use). You can purchase the gel by clicking on the pic ABOVE

There is no set brand of eye wash you have to use. It’s best to use a dog version of an eye rinse though or sterile water whereas the GenTeal brand of dry eye products are actually made for humans but okay to use on pets. I’ve posted a link to our favorite sterile eye wash below. Click on the pic to purchase.

How to Test Your Dog’s Blood Sugar

So the strangest thing as a physician on bringing my newly diabetic dog home, was that I had absolutely no idea what her blood sugar was. In the human world, a diabetic would never be sent home without a glucometer. My anxiety level greatly decreased when with the help of our vet, we got set up for a home testing program. The benefits of home testing are numerous. Your dog will be far better regulated which will decrease the likelihood of acquiring diabetic complications. Your dog will feel better. And get this – your vet bills will decrease. Thats right, your vet bills will decrease. Veterinary blood sugar checks do add up. Not to mention your most accurate blood sugars will always be at home in your pet’s everyday environment. If your dog gets stressed at the vet, they could have a falsely high or low blood sugar. Your vet will help you learn how to adjust your dog’s dose based on home tests and glucose curves. You will be able to make changes faster to regulate your dog by providing this valuable information to your vet. Pretty soon your confidence will soar and you will be pretty much managing your dog’s insulin dosing on your own. In future posts I will go through the different meter options and how to do glucose curves and interpret blood sugars. My preferred meter is the AlphaTrak2 but I will be sure to give pros and cons of all the meters including the AT2.

Click on pic above to purchase our favorite strips.

Click on pic above to purchase our favorite meter.

A few tips not mentioned in the videos: You can fill an old sock with rice that you heat up in the microwave before applying to any test site except the inner lip. This will help bring blood to the area and help you get your sample. Also many pet owners use the Genteel lancing device (www.mygenteel.com) for pain free pokes on everywhere except the inner lip. These occasionally go down to ~$70 in certain colors on Amazon. Since we’ve never needed one, we’d love some feedback from Genteel users!

Click on pic above to purchase.

Hopefully our videos will help get you started. Be sure and comment below with your favorite test sites. We hope everyone has great sugars!

-Devoted Doxie Mom

Click the link above if you need some lancets!

Syringes matter!

So my first topic is going to be making sure you are using the right insulin syringe! Vetsulin requires a U-40 syringe. Novalin N & Humalin N (NPH Insulin) require a U-100 syringe. 1 unit in a U-40 does NOT equal 1 unit in a U-100. U-40’s should have a red needle cap and U-100’s should have an orange needle cap (however always verify your syringe says U-40 or U-100 because some brands are misleading). Syringes comes in different sizes with different size needles. Remember that the smaller the gauge needle, the larger it actually is. So small dogs need a higher gauge. When my ~10lb dachshund was on Vetsulin for a short period, we did use a 29 gauge U-40 but on Novolin N she uses a 3/10cc 31 gauge U-100. A 3/10cc syringe would be my recommendation for a small dog who should never come close to needing 30 units of insulin. I prefer a syringe that has half unit markings as small dogs typically increase doses in half unit increments. I pictured my favorite syringes I buy in a 5 box special deal at a great price from http://www.adwdiabetes.com. I accidentally bought 50 unit syringes in bulk once that didn’t have half unit markings. I hated them. I had a ton of fur shots because the needles seemed flimsy (a fur shot is when you miss some or all of your injection and the insulin ends up in the fur and not in the dog) plus it was harder for me to pull up smaller dose without a ton of air bubbles. I ended up donating them all to my vet. Another important point is if you ever switch between Vetsulin and NPH insulin please make sure there is no way your syringes can get accidentally mixed up. If your syringe does not have half unit markings and you want to dose a half unit, on most syringes if you line up the black tip end of your plunger with the hash from the unit below, the tip of your plunger usually ends up at the halfway mark. This isn’t true for all syringes though. Hope this helps!!

-Devoted Doxie Mom