Leaving Needles On Pen?

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MeanMom

MeanMom

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has anyone had conflicting advice about this? When K was first diagnosed and was on the general ward the (very nice) nurse showed us how to inject etc. She told K to put the new needle on after injecting ' so the pen will always be ready'. Next day the Dsn told us never to do this as the needle could get damaged when you are carrying it around. So we dont (K does everything the dsn says 🙄)

When we were at clinic on Wednesday we had a long chat with her specialist about lots of things but she seemed most concerned about K settling in at high school and she suggested
1 Not testing at Lunch time
2 Putting the needle on the pen in the morning at home so she can just inject anywhere and not trawl all the way to the medical room.

Katie wont even consider doing either of these - does anyone else do this when out of the house?
 
I don't tend to keep the needles on my pen, I've an aunt that is diabetic and she used to tell me stories about hers blocking while she was out and having to rush home if she'd forgot to put in spares ... I don't like having the pen ready when i'm out and about incase (god forbid) i lost it and a child picked it up to inject themselves also. XxXxX
 
Not testing at lunchtime? What kind of advice is that? 😱 If Katie is happy to do these things at school, that sounds like a good thing to me!

I always leave the needles on my pen, and reuse them a couple of times.
 
I leave the needle on the pen I use for humalog but with my novopen for my Levemir I take them off, this is because Levemir does seem to block the needles but humalog doesn't so I reuse a few times.
 
When I was using insulin pens I used to leave the needle on and reuse them several times before disposing off..

I never had problems with blockage either, I think that it more to do with some of the older insulins rather than the new ones..

Concerned about the not testing at dinner time though as she will be losing a lot of data, and if injecting for lunch how is she going to know whether she needs to lower her dose, eat then inject because she border line etc..
 
its all so she has more time to make friends
 
how you cannot test at lunchtime?and we never put the needle on anyway because graham has one for home and one for school
 
Carol never puts the needle on the pen in the morning. Never even thought about the idea.

Carol doesn't test at lunchtime, never has done (now don't shoot me, it was DSN idea). When I once complained to Doc. about her not doing lunchtime test, he was very blase about it too. And there I was thinking he'd support me!!! and say that she should do it. My reasoning was that she needs to do one, so that she can give herself extra should she be high!!😱
 
I used to leave the nedles on, that is until the end came off whilst it was in my pocket (at work) and I bent the needle in half. Luckily I didn't stab myself and had spare needles (always carry them in my coat pocket "just in case") now the needles come off after each injection.
 
Or K could keep pen device with her, but only attach needle when she needs it? I'd guess that needles used with cloudy insulins are more likely to block than clear ones. But I just leave the same needle in place for weeks, so perhaps not a good role model! 🙂

However, I do share her specialist's overall aim to help her settle into high school. Life with diabetes isn't just about diabetes, it's also about enjoying school, friends, clubs, getting a good education etc.
 
I am now on a pump regime but before this I was on MDI. For many years, my standard practice would be to leave the needle on my pen during the day, often for more than one day. I never had any problems with delivery whilst doing this. I changed my approach for about the last two years before I switched to the pump, the main reason being that I had a period of bad control and wanted to eliminate as a possible contributing factor to this the bubbles that an attached needle can cause in the cartridge over time. The other reasons were more to prevent me from reusing the needles. Carrying detached needles around, or forgetting to have one handy, could be a inconvenience though.

I guess the advice to children to have the needle already on the pen and avoid the lunchtime BG test at school is based on the child doing the injection and test themselves without the supervision that an informed parent can provide and also to make the lunchtime injection as quick as possible and keep it inconspicuous to the other children.

My viewpoint on advice of this sort to me as a diabetic is to take it on board ensuring I understand it properly, assess it for myself and then decide myself whether it suites me to take it on board or not. For a child I would recommend you do this for them until they are old and responsible enough to do it for themselves, probably with the help of your opinion initially. 😎
 
I used to leave the needle on my pen and often found the insulin leaked out so my feeling is its a bad idea. Also if you read the patient information leaflet that come with pens they always say to take the needle off once you have used it and not to put another on until you need to use it again. If you are using a mixed insulin in your pen it is definitely not a good idea to do this - if insulin leaked out, it would mess up the long acting/short acting insulin ratio and could potentially make you ill.

I have one pen that lives at home and one that lives in my handbag in the little carry-case, with spare needles and a spare cartridge. I check every day before I leave the house that I have enough spare needles. And it takes me all of 3 seconds to put the new needle on.
 
I used to re-use needles so left it on the pen. I now change every time but leave the old needle on out of habit, and in case I'm somewhere and forget to take a spare. At least I can re-use the old one (which I've been glad of more than once 🙄).

As said, they do tend to allow bubbles to form but that's not such a problem in pens.

Suppose it's different in school if needles are a problem.

Rob
 
Only time I deliberately remove needles is if I know I will be changing altitudes eg in airplane or over high pass by road / foot / bike. In all other cases, I do carry spare needles to avoid risk of not having a needle available, but it's so much quicker and more discrete to be able to inject with a needle already attached.
Plus, it means I use far fewer needles (a box of 100 last me well over a year) and leaves me far fewer waste needles to dispose of safely.

However, all that applies to an adult - the situation about needles / sharps might be very different for a pupil / student in a school.
 
Is it ok to re-use needles over and over then?!
I was always told off by my DSN if I did that! And the pharmacist I work for! I'm sure it's not entirely hygienic either and there must be real risk of infection...?!

Has no one seen those posters of what your needle looks like once you've used it?!
 
Hi Lauren.

As far as hygeine goes, I've only been changing needles every injection for about 4 years. I re-used for 28 years before that and never got any signs of infection.
That said, I did often feel the barb on the end of the needle and would judge whether to change or not.

The final straw was when I moved for the umpteenth time and a very nice nurse told me I really really shouldn't re-use them, so I started to change my habit.

Many of us can remember the stainless steel re-usable needles which attached to the stainless steel and glass syringes. They were made to be used many times and still blunted.

Rob
 
I tend to keep my needle on for a few days.. Mainly because im ususally at work for my 730pm jab and i keep forgetting to take a sharps box with me.

I know when I need to change it when it hurts to stab myself.
 
ok i have experienced the whole doing injections in the medical room etc.
basically i gave up with the medical room, i just had my pen and needles in my bag along with my test kit and just did it anywhere.
but if you don't have much confidence with doing injections in public then i'm not sure what you would do, i don't care anymore what people think about me doing my injections in public just the same as breast feeding in a way.
anyhow, she needs to test at lunch and no you shouldn't leave a new needle on before hand thats a silly idea.
just have new ones, they don't take up that much room nor do they take long to put onto the pen.
 
I always use a new needle. I also wouldn't put a new needle on until I was ready to inject, and certainly not leave one on for days! I read that, with the needle attached you are leaving a route open for possible contamination of the insulin.
 
there was a time i used to change my needle at the end of every cartridge

and then I saw a rather disturbing poster of blunt needles crawling with infection...

You should change after every injection as the needle blunts and there is a risk of infection 🙂
 
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