My target range is 4.0 - 8.0 and my target on my pump is 5.5 mmol/L. Lately my blood sugars have been crazy and Iāve gotten completely sick of the alarm going off constantly, so I turned off my low alert (thereās a built-in low alert at 3.1 mmol/L that canāt be turned off) and set the high alert to 11.0 mmol/L. I still check my Dexcom all the time, but am not bothered by alerts that I know will happen (usually) before they happen, or that keep going off every five minutes while Iām waiting for a situation to resolve.
My corrections depend entirely on my CGM direction. If Iām sitting perfectly flat at 4.0 mmol/L, and am not sleeping and not doing any type of activity that might lower it, I may let it sit there for hours. But if Iām at 6.0 with insulin on baord and an arrow straight down, I may eat 20 grams of carbohdyrates to (hopefully) prevent a low. For lows during the day I use giant Rockets (Smarties in the U.S.), and for lows overnight I use glucose gel.
Highs are actually most difficult for me in terms of corrections. Iāve tried temporary basal rates, doubling my correction bolus, and using extended boluses. No matter what I do, it seems like there are times when the insulin takes hours to begin working, btu once it begins working it lowers me to exactly where I should be. Doing temporary basals or correcting with insulin results in me going low once the insulin finally kicks in and starts working. Iāve found what works best for me is to test every half hour or so and give corrections based on my blood sugar, and give 0.5 or 1.0 units extra if I seem to be heading upward, but no extra insulin if Iām flat or heading down.
Iām hoping that eventually Iāll be able to move my high alert back to 8.0 and have a reasonable chance of not setting it off constantly. Today, for the first time in a long, long, looooong time, I havenāt been above my 11.0 high alert, which is progress!