Did you have a choice?

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jusme

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Type 1
Did you have a choice of which pump you wanted or did you have to take what was offered?

jusme
 
I had what the hospital gave me but so happy with it. I love the Accu-Chek - now using the Insight and it's fantastic. 🙂
 
Maryanne29 said:
I had what the hospital gave me but so happy with it. I love the Accu-Chek - now using the Insight and it's fantastic. 🙂
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Are you happy with the meter? I find it a complete pain, so so slow! Give me the combo meter with the insight pump any day! Have to say the customer service from Roche is nearly always excellent.
 
jusme said:
Did you have a choice of which pump you wanted or did you have to take what was offered?

jusme
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In theory you are meant to have a choice but some hospitals give you a choice of like it or lump it :(
 
I haven't ever had a choice but no matter I'm sure using a pump has saved my life and reading the research others put in to reaching a decision I'm pretty glad I got told, this is what you're using!

I got a Roche back in 1999 when I knew nothing about pumps and didn't have home internet, very scary! I used a Medtronic Veo for 4 years and changed to the Medtronic 640g a few months back which I love. It is a fantastic piece of kit and the customer service and back up is great.

It gave me back some confidence after losing my hypo awareness, removing long acting insulin from my life was the best thing.

I hope you find a pump benefits you and restores confidence for you. They all do the same thing at the end of the day just with different screens, menus, handsets, glucose meters, cannulas, tubing/no tubing, cgm integration etc.

Good luck making a choice- if you have one- and getting started🙂
 
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We weren't given a choice, but had only been diagnosed a week and were still in shock and barely even knew what insulin pumps were - so I'm actually glad that they just thrust the Combo at us and told us to get on with it, if they'd given us a choice I wouldn't have had a clue how to decide which one was best for us. Next year we will be up for pump renewal and I believe then we will get a choice from everything available, now we know a lot more about them we will hopefully be able to make an infiormed decision 🙂
 
I was given a choice of 6 and I hadn't had a pump before so could only listen to what DSN said and then research on Internet. I went for the omnipod because there is no tube but as I only received it today I can't advise except to say it's comfortable and I have high hopes that we will get on together.

I'd like to know if anyone else has omnipod.
 
We were given the accucheck combo. He wouldn't let us have the insight because people have been complaining about it.

Consultant did talk to me able other brands briefly, but I know Roche and like them as a brand, so that conversation didn't go far.
 
I was given the full choice 3 years' ago, read up about each, went to one of the quarterly meetings of the London Insulin Pump Drinks group (social side to the Insulin Pumpers UK list) to actually see the different ones and ask for demos and generally ask loads of hands on questions. I opted for the Animas Vibe in the end as although I felt they were all pretty similar (except tubeless Omnipod), the deciding factor for me was the large, bright and highly readable screen of the Vibe compared with the others (I've had quite a bit of laser and am now 50+ boohoo middle-aged deteriorating vision 😉 )

I'd really quite like a pump with a remote handset, though can live without as I have done so far. Also, I hate various aspects of the Animas infusion sets (tried them all) & much prefer the Roche ones, but that's ok as the Roche sets are compatible with the Vibe luckily.

If your team have assessed you as clinically meeting the criteria for pump funding but your hospital only offers one type of pump and you really really want another for a very good reason (like vision & readability, or maybe not wanting a tubed pump as you have young children who could easily keep ripping it out), you might be able to successfully fight your case for it I think. INPUT would have more info about this.
 
I'd really quite like a pump with a remote handset, though can live without as I have done so far. Also, I hate various aspects of the Animas infusion sets (tried them all) & much prefer the Roche ones, but that's ok as the Roche sets are compatible with the Vibe luckily.
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I was amazed to find out yesterday that animas do the comfort sets. No one had told me rep just flogged the most expensive sets he could.
Have asked for trial packs and if all ok will change my order to something cheaper.
 
Pumper_Sue said:
I was amazed to find out yesterday that animas do the comfort sets. No one had told me rep just flogged the most expensive sets he could.
Have asked for trial packs and if all ok will change my order to something cheaper.
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Yes they do steel cannulas too but they're not shown on their website! And when I phoned & asked about them, the customer service person didn't know about them either! The ones I really disliked (I have a whole list of reasons but will leave it for now..) were the Inset IIs which, as you say, they seem to start everyone off on & very few people ever change or even know you can try and change to other sets. Good point that the Insect IIs as I call them are the most expensive of the Animas sets. Also produce the most waste. Hmmm....
 
ingrid said:
Yes they do steel cannulas too but they're not shown on their website! And when I phoned & asked about them, the customer service person didn't know about them either! The ones I really disliked (I have a whole list of reasons but will leave it for now..) were the Inset IIs which, as you say, they seem to start everyone off on & very few people ever change or even know you can try and change to other sets. Good point that the Insect IIs as I call them are the most expensive of the Animas sets. Also produce the most waste. Hmmm....
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Yes nice lady sent me 3 comfort sets angled and 3 steel. My sugars just climbed with the steel so tried the comfort last night and painless to insert and numbers back to normal so at £69.30 for 10 that's a lot cheaper than the insets at £97.50/10.
I have a complete price list for the animas products including over £8 for 2 batteries. I can buy 4 for that amount in my local shop. 🙄

Found this for you https://www.animascorp.co.uk/infusion-sets
 
Hi Sue, aha they've updated their website! Very chuffed to see that, thx.

I'd love to see a full price list. I've tried numerous times to do price comparisons but been unable to find UK prices, only US ones. Where did you find yours & is it easily accessible?

Sorry to hear that the steel didn't work for you. What I like most about them is the almost zero chance of set failure/kinked cannula but what I don't like is the extra dangly bit - the tubing comes in 2 parts so you don't disconnect at site, which is handy if your site is around on your butt or back but irritating when in the shower & you have it hanging from your body (though as Vibey is waterproof I don't always disconnect for showers). Having said that, I think there is very low failure rate with the angled sets? More than anything, I wish animas would offer an in between tubing length - the short I find too short & the long too long!
 
I'd love to see a full price list. I've tried numerous times to do price comparisons but been unable to find UK prices, only US ones. Where did you find yours & is it easily accessible?
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Send me via pm your email address and I will send it over as have it in excel 🙂
 
Phil, I agree the meter is a little slow but its benefits outweigh this for me. I had more problems with the Combo meter and felt this was the weak link in the system. Overall, the Insight is great. 🙂
 
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