Insulin Pens

[MisterRex]

I'm a type 1 diabetic and was diagnosed at about age 4, and as a kid I had a very severe needle phobia (so a great diagnosis, as you can imagine). I was given the NovoPen Junior at the time, alongside the Penmate. I have never used any other type of insulin pen (I initially had a nighttime insulin pen of the same brand with the PenMate but I had that taken away while in hospital with memory loss because the hospital decided it was a 'bit grubby'.) and to this day, around 13 years later I still use that same pen. Despite having the NovoPen Echo, I still have never learnt to manually inject and i'm still scared of needles, having the PenMate makes my injections manageable and trying to teach myself to use a regular pen resorts in tears and sweating.

So as much as 'just learn to do things like everyone else had to' would be ideal, I would absolutely prefer to continue using the PenMate or something similar- but I haven't been able to find anything like it because the NovoPen Junior and the PenMate are both discontinued, and neither are available online. As much as my pen is still in working condition and not at the end of it's life- it is very robust-, I can't imagine it lasting my entire life.

Is there anything else like that on the market, which can be used with a refillable cartridge pen?

 

[Robin]

Hello, and welcome to the forum. I don't use anything like that myself, but I know some people on here have something similar. @TheClockworkDodo uses some sort of cover that means she doesn't have to see the needle, I think she may not be around much at the moment, but if you do a search of her previous posts, I'm sure she's mentioned it a couple of times recently.
Edit, if you look here
https://forum.diabetes.org.uk/boards/threads/ask-diabetes-uk.59591/page-16#post-749124
posts #311 onwards have info about what's available.

 

[Ljc]

Hi MisterRex. I found this post by @TheClockworkDodo over on the Ask diabetes uk thread
I hope you find it helpful .
I use Novopen Echos with Novofine Autocover needles, @Nathan - I am also unable to see a needle going into skin, and I'm fine with these, though they are a bit long (8mm). I've tried the BD Autoshield as well - so far as I remember the advantage of that is it's shorter, but the disadvantage is it's wider so you have less control over where the needle goes.

 

[MisterRex]

I've had a look at the product mentioned and while it would probably be a better alternative than just the plain injection, the PenMate is a bit different in that it doesn't exactly hide the needle, more that it pushes it into the skin for you. But that is still helpful, thank you both.