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hypos / aviva expert

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

soozeee

Member
Relationship to Diabetes
Type 1
Hi All

I started using the Aviva Expert about 3 weeks ago and my sugars have hugely improved which am chuffed about; however...... I am now hypoing a few times a day

I have reduced my daytime basal from 18 -> 9 over the 3 weeks but still getting pre meal hypo's. Still take 18 basal at night approx 10pm as have probs with waking up high

I think I am calcultaing my carbs correctly and then give the bolus suggested by my monitor

Am currently set at 1.5 U - 1 KE (1 units to bring sugars down by 2.5) until 10am and 1:1 for rest of day (1 unit to bring down by 3). I was at 2:1 in moring but reduced this due to late morning hypos

For the last 15 years my hba1c and thus sugars have been too high and thus I tended not to really hypo and am finding these regular hypo's upsetting and frustrating to say the least. especially when I need to loose weight and diet but am currently having to snack to correct sugars and eat lunch and dinner when determined by sugars as opposed to my own plans and hunger!! 😡

any advice would be greatly received

Cheers x
 
Hi soozee. I don't have an expert (can't get one Grrrr 😡) but I won't hold a grudge ! :D

If it were me, I would find a nice low to medium GI meal that I trust and would plan this for 2 or 3 days on the trot.
I would then tweak my bolus, based on the expert's advice, oevr the 2 or 3 days until I was finding a good balance between low spike and no hypo afterwards.
I would then recalculate my ratio based on how much bolus I'd had and how many carbs I'd eaten and base other meals on this ratio (same time of day of course) and see if it works.
All of this assuming your basal is correct. I've never done a basal test (I know, I know🙄) but it may be appropriate for you to start with one to check all is well in the background.

You might be able to calculate your ratio based on your current units by adding up your main meal plus all the corrections for hypos, assuming you're not over-correcting and then divide the total carbs by the units.

Rob
 
God that all sounds a bit bloody complications - especially when i so bad at maths!! lol but def worth a go

what meals would you suggest testing it with? I juust had soup and toast with a yogurt after for lunch. pre meal 5 and just tested and 8.8 so ok so far....

I think the monitor has over corrected at times leading to some of the hypos but thats prob my fault for testing too often and confusing it!!
 
soozeee said:
God that all sounds a bit bloody complications - especially when i so bad at maths!! lol but def worth a go

what meals would you suggest testing it with? I juust had soup and toast with a yogurt after for lunch. pre meal 5 and just tested and 8.8 so ok so far....

I think the monitor has over corrected at times leading to some of the hypos but thats prob my fault for testing too often and confusing it!!
Click to expand...

I have the aviva expert as well and was just giving what it said even when I had had a low reading and took 1 jelly babby then when it came to my next reading for the meal time it was high and so I have stoped giving the correction and by the next meal then it is not to bad and back on track. I would just give the ratio for the meal and not the correction might help good look.
 
Hi Soozee

Couple of questions (I do have an Expert - sorry Rob!)

1. Have you tested your basal? If not it's all but impossible to know whether the hypos are based on your meal doses or just down to too much basal which will royally mess up your meal doses anyway

2. Not exactly sure how you have yours set up, it is with whole or fractional units. If fractional I guess you would have to round up or down the dose suggestion?

3. Is there any reason why you chose to use KE (CP style 10g carbs) units rather than grams?

If you want very tweakable units:carbs you can set it up using grams for carbs and whole units like this:

Desired setting 1.5u to 10g carbs. Set expert as 15u to 100g carbs (times both by 10). The ratio is exactly the same, but you can change them quite subtly

14u : 100g (1.4:10) or
15u : 105g blah blah blah...

The bolus advice you get will always be in whole units (the rounding up/down happening at the calculation stage). You just have to whack the meal amounts in as grams (to the nearest 5 seems to be good enough for me)

It took me a good few months of trial and error to get happy with my Expert settings. And I'm still occasionally tweaking them now!


Accu chek Expert Review - One month in
Learning to love my Accu chek Expert
 
Thanks for your replies

I am also thinking that ignoring the correction doeses is probably a good idea as i do think it is them causing a fair few of the hypos

in answer to the questions....

1) I was doing night time basal tests last week and was tending to be in range for that one - how do i do a daytime basal test? do i have to miss a meal? 😱

2) not sure what you mean with this question? it is set at 1.5 units to 1 before 10am and 1:1 after

3) choose KE's coz that is what rep and DSN told me to do. KE's are like dapne CPs is that right? would i be better in grms?

Thanks
 
I use the Freestyle InsulinX ,which I imagine is very similar to the Expert....

I have programmed in my insulin/carb ratios in for each meal using the CPs option as opposed to grams, as this allow me to enter in how many units I need for 1 CP, where it does not let you put in this when using the grams........I done DAFNE so I work with Carb portions anyway.......

I can also enter in how much 1 unit of insulin drops me by, this can change as we all know, but the InsulinX only allows different corrections for different times of the day, which for me does not apply, its the level my BG is at that governs how effective 1 unit is............is this the same for the expert?

What I would say about these meters, and I am sure the companies also, is that they are only guide and should be there only to check your manual calculations, well, that's my thought anyway, this due to the inability of it to allow me to customize my correction....
 
I use the Combo version as I've got the insulin pump, very similar though,..

The bolus wizard once set up correctly is very good, but you do at times need to over rule it..

I find that with mine it isn't good at calculating a bolus when I'm crossing over from one ratio zone to another more so when I'm using the extended or multi-wave bolus..

The other is calculating bolus's when the BG reading makes you slightly more resistant to insulin, fortunately this is now a very rare problem, as I tend not to hit these levels..

So sometimes I do overule the wizard rather than expect it's advice
 
yea it is the same for the expert ur insulin sensitivity is set in time blocks.

Yea beginning to see that it is more of a guide than a brain! It has certainly helped improved my sugars but it has also caused some unnessary hypos' so gona have to use a bit more of my own working out too from here on......
 
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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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