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Hotel stay!

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This thread is now closed. Please contact Anna DUK, Ieva DUK or everydayupsanddowns if you would like it re-opened.
ivygirl

ivygirl

Active Member
Relationship to Diabetes
Type 2
Last weekend I stayed in a Solihull hotel. I had booked months earlier and phoned 4 weeks ago to check booking and to remind them of my diabetes and the need to keep my medication in a fridge! No fridges in the rooms so I understood my epi pen would be kept in their fridge and I could collect it when needed from the bar. The first time I did my injection I mentioned the pen did not feel very chilled! My answer? "Well it's in a room that is fairly cool. You cannot keep anything like that in a fridge with food" !!!!!! I guess no one in Solihull is a diabetic!!
 
Hi Ivygirl, nice to hear from you again 🙂 Do you mean your insulin pen? If so, you can keep the pen at room temperature for 28 days, so doesn't need to be kept in a fridge 🙂 Having said that, it's wrong of the hotel not to follow the instructions they have agreed to!
 
I'm puzzled, as in-use insulin doesn't need to be kept in a fridge. In fact, it should be kept at room temperature, not refridgerated.

Food hygiene rules are very strict, and nothing other than food should be kept in a commercial food & drink fridge. That should have been explained at the time.

I'd be far happier to keep insulin on my person than in a fridge behind a bar.

EpiPens containing adrenaline, used for several allergic reactions, should never be refridgerated.
 
Same as others, I'm confused because insulin pen shouldn't be kept in the fridge. Plus, if ever I have to use insulin directly from the fridge it hurts like crazy. What is it you are taking?

Just a tangent here, but about 10 years ago I was living in my dad's car with him. Then we were put in a B and B type place, temporary housing. We didn't have a fridge. Didn't have anything. I used to get my insulin every two weeks from the pharmacy, and they said it was okay to not keep my insulin in the fridge as it was just a few weeks.
 
I keep all my insulin in the fridge. It gets warm here sometimes.😛
 
Bloden said:
I keep all my insulin in the fridge. It gets warm here sometimes.😛
Click to expand...

Where are you?
It hurts way too much for me to inject cold insulin
 
In Spain, Amberzak. It doesn't hurt me straight out the fridge. If I didn't keep it all together in one place, I'd forget where it was!🙄
 
Amberzak said:
Where are you?
It hurts way too much for me to inject cold insulin
Click to expand...

I'm always forgetting to put a new cartridge in when I finish the old one, so injections from new ones always come straight from the fridge. Doesn't really bother me or make much difference to me, I have found 🙂
 
Northerner said:
I'm always forgetting to put a new cartridge in when I finish the old one, so injections from new ones always come straight from the fridge. Doesn't really bother me or make much difference to me, I have found 🙂
Click to expand...

So, basically, what you're both saying is that I'm a freak 😉
 
I know what Amberzak is saying. It does make you jump if its a different temp to yourself. If you are hot blooded 😱 When I used to jetski in the North Sea in January I could put my crash helmet on the beach & steam used to come off it 😱
 
Sorry Ivygirl, I don't understand why you'd need to keep either insulin or your Epipen in the hotel's fridge? It would be highly inconvenient to have to keep asking for your insulin, and surely pretty dangerous to have to ask for an Epipen in the event you were having an allergic reaction - your Epipen should always be kept with you.
 
I bow to superior knowledge! I am on Byetta not insulin! the chemist and my DN said it should be kept in the fridge!
 
The byetta website says once you start using it, you can store it at room temperature. I would get confirmation that you need to keep it in the fridge. If you don't need to it sounds like it would save you worry and hassle.

Best of luck and hope you had a nice time away anyway!
 
ivygirl said:
Last weekend I stayed in a Solihull hotel. I had booked months earlier and phoned 4 weeks ago to check booking and to remind them of my diabetes and the need to keep my medication in a fridge! No fridges in the rooms so I understood my epi pen would be kept in their fridge and I could collect it when needed from the bar. The first time I did my injection I mentioned the pen did not feel very chilled! My answer? "Well it's in a room that is fairly cool. You cannot keep anything like that in a fridge with food" !!!!!! I guess no one in Solihull is a diabetic!!
Click to expand...
OMG

That's the sort of hotel that should be named and shamed.

I'm getting on a bit, 62 years young, but I'm saddened by how totally stupid people are. Their answer should be framed somewhere, in fact, how about getting it printed and framed for the MD to hang on the office wall. God help us. Glad you're OK
BTW I think they got it round the wrong way, they shouldn't keep certain foods with the epi pen. I'm thinking the food is probably more dangerous than the pen.
 
Nevertheless:
for the hotel to agree to to the storage in a fridge and then blatantly disregard the agreement without notification, I would be
1)
taking the matter that agreed storage procedures were blatantly disregarded to the highest level of management and
2) Not use that particular hotel again!
 
Yes, although there was the confusion with regards to your actual medicine, what they did was wrong. If you say you need a fridge, a fridge should be provided. If you were a wheelchair user and they told you the room was accessible, and you arrived and it wasn't, you'd have rights to complain, so same should apply to the hotel.

I think I was so wrapped up in the confusion of the insulin (I have no knowledge of Byetta), that I forgot to comment on the actual issue, which is that you made a request based on medical needs, or needed a fridge, which they said they could supply. And then they didn't keep to their promise.
 
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This thread is now closed. Please contact Anna DUK, Ieva DUK or everydayupsanddowns if you would like it re-opened.
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