I am noticing I am bruising more often after insulin injection on stomach. What do you guys do to prevent the bruising. What are other areas you can to the insulin injections?
I have the same issue…probably one injection out of 10 bruises badly.
I find that it usually really stings while injecting too.
I dont have a solution and have never injected anywhere else apart from my stomach…will be interested to see if anybody has any suggestions
This really varies tremendously. I get a bruise maybe a couple of times a month. That’s with an average of 5 to 7 injections a day. I don’t see any correlation at all between stinging and bruising. But . . . YDMV
Get the highest quality needles you can and inject them like you’re throwing a dart, that will only slightly reduce your liklihood of snagging a vein on the way in, which is what causes a bruise-- but it’s about all you can really do…
The first thing to do is make sure you are using a good technique. Your injection should be very quick, like a flick. A good description for a “painless injection” technique is over at DiabetesInControl (this is actually written by Dr. B). If you slowly insert the needle you will often do far more damage. Another thing I have found (at least in myself) is that after inserting the needle, if I feel any pain I have have a higher risk of a bruise. So if I insert the needle and it hurts I pull it out and insert it another place.
And as a final note, you may find that altering your pinch and needle length helps. Some people find they can use a 4mm pen needle without a pinch and it works well. It didn’t work well for me, I use 8mm.
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Good stuff thank u.
You should not be using your stomach exclusively. You should be rotating sites in order to avoid lipoatrophy/lipodystrophy.
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So what other areas are you injecting?
My daughter has Type 1 and she uses a pump. She rotates placement between her tummy, thighs, love handles, lower back, may soon consider using “the girls” as she’s developing enough for this to become feasible.
I am not pumping yet. Just injecting once a day with levemir. Is it still a good idea to inject basal insulin in legs?
In the fatty parts of your upper/outer thighs is fine for basal insulin. You don’t want to inject into leaner areas. I also use the crests of my buttocks, top and bottom where there’s extra padding.
FWIW, I seem to have had some sort of reaction specifically to Humalog insulin. I bruised just about every time I used a Humalog pen. I rarely bruise with other insulins. Have you switched insulins lately?
The key thing, wherever you inject, is to rotate through several sites (more is better) to avoid lipodystrophy and scarring, which can make absorption more difficult. Personally I have 18 sites I rotate through so each site gets a couple of days’ rest before it get used again.
Also, for basal insulin (lantus, levemir, tresiba), it’s important to make sure you are injecting subcutaneously, not intramuscularly. Intramuscular injections can be useful for bolus insulin, but for basal they make absolutely no sense whatever.
I intermittently make an attempt to rotate sites in an organized and methodical fashion… About the best I’ve actually been able to stick to with consistency is using the left side of my body the first two weeks-- always left stomach/ love handles for bolus, left thigh/ butt for basal, and left hand for finger pokes… And then the right side for the second two weeks of the month. Better than nothing I guess.
I try to be optimistic that someday I will have enough fewer concerns in life that organized site rotation might be higher on my list.
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the link that @Brian_BSC included in his comment to you has a diagram of suggested injection sites - look at that and you’ll see lots of places.
LOL . . . so of course, shortly after writing that, I acquired a nice ugly new one. The Lord has a warped sense of humor. 
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