ongoing high blood sugar...... dr cannot find a cause

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jinty

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Type 1
Hi, I'm a 48 year old diabetic of 36 years standing. Over the past few years i have been having problems with control. I am allergic to some preservatives in insulin and am back on actrapid and insultard. Have been to dr a lot over past year for medical infections, therefore high sugars etc. Dr cannot find anything obvious for high sugars ( running 14/20 WITH extra doses??) diabetic specialist cannot pin anything down either but all i am doing is increasing insulin. alternating sites regularily Need to get better sugars , feeling rubbish and worried about complications/
ANY advice welcome 🙂
 
Two things occur to me - the first one is ? injection sites. Just because you have no visible lumps bumps or hollows, doesn't necessarily mean the site is still viable. Do you have any 'virgin' areas (eg your bum or arms) you could try for a change and see if it helps.

Second is - have you tried animal insulin recently? - we had no option when we were disgnosed LOL - and I built up antibodies to porcine insulin, no idea if I still have them and anyway I've never tried bovine, so that would be on my shopping list were I yourself.
 
A friend has experienced insulin resistance. Two things have helped them. The first was that the clinic prescribed metformin and the second was getting their BMI back to the normal range (obviously this may not be relevant here). It may also be worth getting a referral to another diabetic specialist as from experience some are not that special. :(
 
Hi jinty. Welcome 🙂

Can't add to what's been said. Excellent ideas. Can you tell us what you've tried doing so far? eg. exercise, etc. 🙂

Rob
 
Hi there Jinty is your gp responsible for your care at the moment? Are you able to ask for a referral to your local diabetic clinic? There are specialist diabetic nurses who Dedicate all their time to helping people to keep their blood sugars within range. When I first visited my GP he told me very confidently that he had all the experiencing and training necessary to look after my needs and almost seemed offended when I insisted on a hospital referral, especially because 2 of his Practise nurses had done a course in looking after diabetic patients.


but it was well worth all my requests. I went to a hospital clinic, They sent me on a DAPHNE course, agreed with me that even though my HbA1c looked brilliant, my control was still appaulling, and completely changed the way I approach my diabetic control.
 
Assuming your dosages are correct overall, it might be worth seeing if a change in diet has a dramatic effect - if so, it means you're likely to have a bad case of insulin resistance.

You might want to try doing a week or so of strict no-carbing and rigorous testing - that'll show you quite clearly if there's an issue with you using insulin during glucose spikes.

It might even be worth asking your doctor about combining your insulin with some of the T2 medication out there - some of these are supposed to improve insulin efficiency so they might be helpful. Have you also considered looking at the animal insulins? Some people find these work much better for them than the modern synthetic ones.
 
Even though this has been going on for a long time, have you checked to make sure your pens are working correctly, or even tried different lengths of needle?
 
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