Testing Techniques and Your Diabetic Dog

Today we will talk about developing your own testing technique. You now have a Diabetic pup, have made the wise decision to test your pup at home, (a decision that I applaud you for!) and need to remember to breathe and try to relax. This is a learning curve and it takes time.

So… You got your meter and now you need to figure out what to do with it. I’d suggest that you open the short manual that comes with it and get it set up and ready to go. Now that you have all of the items set like the date and time you are ready to figure out how to use the thing! Let me start by saying that there is a reason that it comes with 25 or 35 strips, it’s so you can take your time and acknowledge that you are going to waste some strips getting your technique down. It’s always a good idea to order extra strips right from the start.

Unless you have some experience using a handheld glucometer, this part of the learning curve could take a bit of time. Every meter wicks the blood from the sample a little differently. Some meters/strips take their samples from the side of the strip, some from the end of the strip. Since the PetTest is our meter of choice, I’ll address that one.

First, when you take the strip out of the foil wrapper, don’t touch the end of the strip with your fingers. If you have anything on your hands like some grease from those chips that you just ate, or a bit of peanut butter or jelly left over from making the kid’s lunch for school, it can affect your reading as well as affect the strip’s ability to wick the blood into the chamber. So for the PetTest meter, you’ll want to handle the strips on the sides, not on the ends.

When you load the strip into the meter, hold it on the sides of the strip when you insert it into the meter, don’t push it in from the end where the chamber is for the blood. Now, I’m going to suggest that you practice on yourself until you feel confident that you can poke (your finger), get a large enough blood drop (which in the case of the PetTest, is a very tiny amount), just touch the edge of the strip to the blood drop and the strip will draw the blood into the chamber. Let the strip do the work for you, no need to help it along.  If you don't want to practice on yourself, use the control solution that comes with the kit.  Whatever your choice, DO practice before you try testing your dog. 

Here are some things NOT to do. Don’t scoop the blood. Don’t shovel the blood. Don’t keep applying more and more blood to the strip. If you will just lightly touch the edge of the strip to the blood drop, the strip will wick the blood into the chamber. Easy as that!

I will suggest that you try it on yourself several times so that when you do approach your pup, you are confident and ready to do this! If you are timid and worried, your pup will pick up on those emotions and he or she will also be worried that this isn’t going to go well. So, to prepare…. Do some deep knee bends, meditate for a minute, pray, breathe deeply; take a few laps around the block, whatever it takes to shake off your nerves! Lol

Depending on where you are going to test, you will need to prepare the area a bit. I used the inside of the upper lip so there was no preparation involved, just flip up the lip, wipe the area with the back of my hand, poke, get the sample, give a small cube of chicken breast and we are DONE! I know that we all think that this process hurts our pup, but it really doesn’t. There are so many places on our pups that don’t have a lot of nerve endings; it really isn’t a painful process. I would venture to say that the noise that the lancing device makes is more startling than the poke itself. The lancing device used to startle Max, so I just poked freehand with the lancet held in my fingers.

If you are going to test in one of the many other places, you may need to shave a small patch of fur off of your preferred spot. To see your testing choices, you may want to refresh your memory in the blog post about  “Having Trouble Getting Blood”. If the blood doesn’t bead up and form a nice drop for you, you can put a very thin layer of Vaseline or coconut oil on the surface and that will cause the blood to form a nice bead for you to just lightly touch the strip of the meter to.

So to wrap this up, don’t be afraid to use some strips getting your technique down on yourself before you ever go near your pup. If you don’t want to test yourself, then consider using the control solution that came in your kit to help you get your technique refined. If you take this approach, you won’t have doubts about whether or not you can do this. You will be confident and ready to add “testing expert” to your ever growing list of skills! I know that you can do this! Go get ‘em!

Notice that for most of the products or groups that I mention, the text is linked to a website that you can purchase that item or a link to join the group mentioned. Just click on the colored text (red or blue, depending what device you are on) and it should take you right to the item or group. If you have any thoughts or ideas for topics that you’d like to see covered here, please feel free to comment below or send me an email at NancyForPetTest@PharmaSupply.com. As always, please “like” this blog post or any of the others that have helped you or just refreshed your memory. Look for new posts every Monday, Wednesday and Friday!

Until next time…