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Shower sets Libre 2+ low alarm off.

PattiEvans

PattiEvans

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Type 1
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I do like my shower quite hot and recently it's been setting the Libre 2+ low alarm off every time I have a shower. It's awkward to get out of the shower half way through to open up the app and stop the alarm. However, when I am out of the shower and the sensor has cooled down the alarm stops as the blood glucose level comes up over the alarm level quite quickly. It's just irritating. Does anyone else experience this?
 
Showers (and baths) can do weird things, yes. I presume temperature increases can change interstitial fluid, maybe its consistency? And encourage blood flow towards the skin surfaces. Or something like that.
 
I do often get pump alarms when in the shower, but hadn’t thought they might be fakers caused by temperature. Interesting thought @PattiEvans - thanks!
 
My blood glucose level goes up in the bath....
 
my libra usually goes up under a hot shower then drops quite quickly, especially if I lay down after my shower - which I often do if it’s been a long day I do like to shower then bed
 
Bruce Stephens said:
Mine too, usually. And then drops quite quickly once I get out (back to roughly what it was before).
Click to expand...
That is what my CGM reports - BG goes up while I am in the shower and then returns to about the same level soon after I dry myself. I don’t believe it. How can my BG go down with no IOB if my body produces none of its own? And it can’t be coincidence that my BG returns to the same pre-shower levels and is then stable,
I think it is a case of the hot water causing my CGM to report a false high.
But it is interesting that others have the opposite effect.
 
I haven't noticed any changes from showering, I do have it quite hot but I don't linger, so maybe I'm just not in there long enough.
I did notice a significant rise during a hot bath, though.
 
I've never, ever so far noticed a difference from showering and can't say I ever did from a bath either. However - 10 mins in a hot, hot tub, sauna or steam bath sends me hypo as hell.
 
Do like my showers hot & not noticed any alarms going off, tend not to shower straight after breakfast as heat from water can speed up insulin absorption.
 
Mine always goes up during shower, checked Libre vs Blood this morning, Libre was 4 mmol/L higher and came down short while after.
 
Ah, seems to me judging by the diversity of responses that it is symptomatic of our personal physiology as to whether we go up or down and not the heat causing the Libre to react in a particular way....
 
I went to visit my brother last Thursday with my sister to make a few modifications to his house to try to make life a little more comfortable for him as he is in recovery from a fractured pelvis. He has the heating turned up pretty high because he is not able to move about much and feels the cold easily. My sister and I were dying of the heat, especially as we were working upstairs a lot of the time and I have never eaten so many unbolused biscuits since before diagnosis (obviously didn't need to bolus before diagnosis 🙄) It wasn't overly exertive work but the heat clearly dramatically affected my insulin sensitivity and kept dropping my levels! I normally can't even get away with a single unbolused biscuit when I am hypo at home! It was a biscuit bonanza... I had 2 custard creams, a jammy dodger and a large chocolate chip cookie as well a cup of milky coffee oh and 2 jelly babies before that!
On the original topic of showering causing lows, there is no set pattern to my alarms when I am in the shower. Sometimes it is the high alarm and sometimes the low and I do like a nice hot shower. Maybe the highs are because I am often running late to get ready to go somewhere, so stress pushes levels up
 
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