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New member. Old Diabetic

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Eddie2me

New Member
Relationship to Diabetes
Type 2
Hi,
Had diabetes for a few years now, My Mums had it for about 15 years. We literally call ourselves the worst diabetics in the world, can't pass a sweet snack or having a pick of an evening.

Reason I am posting today, my Mum got taken into hospital 2 weeks ago with Blood Sugar levels of over 29.9, they regulated her sugars and let her out Friday with her meds and insulin. Told her to make sure she took her 30ml of Humulin(?) of a morning and 20ml of an evening, along with other tabs

Went to take her this morning and couldn't. Called an ambulance and they came right away, tested her bloods and it was 1.6, so the complete other way.

Not sure about how to go about making sure it don't happen? Best place to start, tips? Anything
 
It is essential that you contact her diabetic team. They can then talk you through how to adjust doses. Any initial dose is a best guess. With a level that low it is clear that she had too much insulin.
Her team will need to advise on an appropriate change.

I hope that you can get this sorted soon
 
This must've been a really frightening experience @Eddie2me hopefully the paramedics were able to treat her quickly and you haven't been left too shaken by it. As @SB2015 has said it is only really your mum's diabetes nurse or doctor who can advise about dose changes, so I do hope they are not too tricky to get hold of for advice - I appreciate it is more difficult to contact people at the moment.
Has your mum been advised to test any more frequently since starting on insulin? It is certainly a good idea to test before bed and if on the lower side of normal it may be an idea to have a snack before going to sleep and maybe even setting an alarm to test once during the night while her doses are fine tuned. Keeping something to treat a hypo with by the bed is also a good idea, so if she does wake up feeling low she is able to treat it easily.

It might also be helpful to give the DUK Helpine a call tomorrow, they can't advise about insulin doses but they can talk you through the move onto insulin and how to treat and prevent hypos - https://www.diabetes.org.uk/How_we_help/Helpline
 
Really sorry to hear about your Mum @Eddie2me

Hope she is feeling much better now, and that you’ve managed to get in contact with the hospital about revising doses.

It might also be worth enquiring about ‘Glucagon’ which is an injectable emergency medicine to treat hypoglycaemia in people who have lost consciousness.

It sounds like you need a lot more information and support than you’ve currently had :(
 
LucyDUK said:
This must've been a really frightening experience @Eddie2me hopefully the paramedics were able to treat her quickly and you haven't been left too shaken by it. As @SB2015 has said it is only really your mum's diabetes nurse or doctor who can advise about dose changes, so I do hope they are not too tricky to get hold of for advice - I appreciate it is more difficult to contact people at the moment.
Has your mum been advised to test any more frequently since starting on insulin? It is certainly a good idea to test before bed and if on the lower side of normal it may be an idea to have a snack before going to sleep and maybe even setting an alarm to test once during the night while her doses are fine tuned. Keeping something to treat a hypo with by the bed is also a good idea, so if she does wake up feeling low she is able to treat it easily.

It might also be helpful to give the DUK Helpine a call tomorrow, they can't advise about insulin doses but they can talk you through the move onto insulin and how to treat and prevent hypos - https://www.diabetes.org.uk/How_we_help/Helpline
Click to expand...

Understand how to raise BG numbers in the short time, but is there anything that would lower her numbers if they were a bit high, but not high enough for Insulin?
 
I don't know a number that is not considered 'high enough' for insulin, but then I know exactly what numbers I'm aiming for, throughout every day. Correcting higher than wanted BG by injecting extra insulin is a bit of an advanced technique from where you and mum are at the moment, Eddie.

As far as I'm aware, there is no version of Humulin which is equivalent to the fast-ish acting short-ish duration insulins that T1s usually use these days and we would use for 'correction' doses. There is Humulin S, which is the quickest one, but it never gets going for at least 40 minutes then stays active for around 6/7 hours. Can have a vicious kick after about 5+ hours - ask the crash barrier in the middle of the M42 near Bromsgrove, just don't let's talk about the two cars I wrote off crashing into said barrier when very suddenly very hypo. Humulin I, for intermediate - can hang round for 18+ hours. Humulin M3, a mixed insulin. 70% intermediate and 30% S. Never taken that one.

Sorry, obviously I have no personal experience of Type 2 on insulin.

How young is mum Eddy?
 
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