Insulin

[Richard hodges]

Hi the just to let u all know,those that take tresiba there seems to be a national shortage be aware.

 

[helli]

Hi the just to let u all know,those that take tresiba there seems to be a national shortage be aware.

For the last month, there have been frequent reports of a lack of pre-filled pens but no issues with the cartridges for the (much better) reusable pens.

Is there now also a shortage of cartridges?

 

[rebrascora]

I believe it is just the prefilled plastic pens which are in short supply so this is a good prompt to change to reuseable pens and Tresiba cartridges. The reusable pens are really nice quality, have a last dose memory feature which shows your last dose in units and how long ago you injected it for those "did I or didn't I?" moments, are better for the environment and the cartridges take up less room in your fridge, so lots of benefits to them. You need to ask your doctor to prescribe you either a NovoPen Echo Plus (max dose is 30units in half unit intervals) or the NovoPen 6 which is 60 unit max dose in whole units, so if you are on small doses you may find the Echo with it's half doses really useful, or if on larger doses (more than 30units), the NovoPen 6 would be what you need.

You will also need a spare pen as back up. The reuseable pens are very robust but no good not having a back up if the worst were to happen. You then need your prescription changed from PenFills to Tresiba Cartridges.

 

[rebrascora]

I should say that I have gone into so much detail above because your GP will likely be clueless, so if you can point them in the right direction for what you need, they are more likely to get it right. 😉

Edited to add....The above comment is not intended to sound derogatory about GPs (although reading it back it does) but just that they do not generally deal with the prescribing of insulin and the pens and technology associated with it's use, because that is a specialist field of knowledge and they are General Practitioners. It will take far too long to get your consultant of nurse at the clinic to change your prescription in this scenario and as @Bruce Stephens suggests below, the pharmacist might be a better option to get it sorted.

 

[Bruce Stephens]

Here's a summary. I'd expect a GP to quite likely not know (unless they happen to support lots of patients with diabetes) but a GP based pharmacist would (and would quite likely be able to switch anyone over):

Tresiba Flextouch Shortage

Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) has issued a medicine supply notification for Tresiba Flextouch 100units/ml solution for injection 3ml pre-filled pens Information is available on website: Medicine Supply Notification: Tresiba (insulin degludec) FlexTouch - Community Pharmacy England...

www.diabetes.org.uk