That business of her having to call her mother when she was having a low is ridiculous. But I have to tell you that schools worry more about liability issues than about children's (or staff's) health. And then you have the school nurses association, which was arguing that only a nurse should be allowed to give a child an insulin shot -- again ridiculous in an era when most schools DON'T have full-time nurses. If a parent can learn to give shots, why can't a health aide?
I was also wondering about what I saw on her belly -- I think I saw a Medtronic sensor, but was there a Dexcom sensor too? Getting input from 2 different sources is an interesting idea.
And the other thing I'm wondering about is, algorithms. Predictive alerts are well and good, but what if the machine predicts that you're going high, and gives insulin, but you level off instead (I do that) and then it sends you low? And is there currently any kind of glucagon that lasts as long as 3 days?
More questions than answers! And I DO agree that while an artificial pancreas is a fun idea, getting adequate treatment to the folks who currently are being neglected is higher on my priority list, too! :-)
I suspect the other gizmos plugged in are "aftermarket" gear that the lab cooked up on their own, probably correlated with the "commercial grade" stuff, to see if they can make it work together? I'm totally guessing though?
I really only want one if they can guarantee it will beat me.
There have been a few studies lately about children not waking for hypoglycemia during the night. I can't find the exact one right now, it was linked on the front page of Children With Diabetes Website. Really all it took was one night my gut telling me to test and having to wake him up to treat a low. We've caught a couple of undetected lows from night time testing. It has had greater benefit for catching and treating highs (above 300) instead of spending 9 hrs at that number. I only test my son once at night, unless something else is going on.
I decided that most of the information in the article was exaggerated for effect.
Is the risk of not waking up for lows restricted to children, or does it apply to everyone with Type 1 diabetes? I'd think your risk of not waking up from a low would actually increase the older you got (and longer you had diabetes).
I think testing once overnight is reasonable, especially for a younger child. Heck, if I can't get to sleep or wake up in the middle of the night for any reason I always test, and sometimes will find myself high (more often than finding myself low). I do have to get quite low before I wake up (like around 2.2 mmol/L or 40 mg/dl), so if I do randomly catch an overnight low then I'll test for the next few nights, but not forever.
I think the risk of lows for kids today is probably much less than it was 15-20+ years ago. What's probably changed is that parents see articles like the one you mentioned and get all freaked out and then (in some cases) go overboard with their reaction.
This is why every parent of a child with T1 should hire a menopausal woman as a live-in nanny. We can't sleep for more than 3 or 4 hours at a stretch anyway -- might as well use us for the middle-of-the-night testing. Sigh.
HA HA..You are right Laguitariste. This post menopausal honey is up betwen 2:30-4:00 am almost every morning..sometimes I check my blood glucose and sometimes not.. I usually go to the computer and Tudiabetes..like right now at 4:00 am EST
Yep! What a wasted resource we are! I could check several dozen people's BGs before I could fall back asleep for the next little stretch. I recently had a BIG day at a guitar festival (fourteen hours of go-go-go from door to door) and slept nine hours in a row. I couldn't believe it. Nine hours! It was like winning the Sleep Lottery! ;0)
a. I think that the media is going a little too far with this. I mean, it is a neat thing, but not exactly a "cure". Still, if the FDA approves this, it would make diabetes a good deal easier.
b. It does look as though Elle and her mom could back off a little. Waking up every three hours every night is not only hard for her mom, it also disturbs Elle's sleep. Maybe a pump or some sort of change would be good for them (although it looks as though she might already have one). You'd think that after four years, they would have solved this night-time issue.
p.s. Did anyone else feel like saying, "big deal" when Elizabeth Cohen said how Elle was testing 10-12 times a day and sometimes had lows and had to give herself insulin?
> p.s. Did anyone else feel like saying, "big deal" when Elizabeth Cohen > said how Elle was testing 10-12 times a day and sometimes had
> lows and had to give herself insulin?
My two cents: I think it's a valid window into how someone who is not a PWD (person with diabetes) may view things. A lot of focus on some discrete tasks, like shots and bg tests, without a good broader view.
Yep. I always feel like laughing now -- and not a very nice laugh -- when people say (in that Minnie-Mouse horrified sympathy voice), "Oh, I don't see how you can stick yourself with a needle!"
I just think, "Honey, you have no idea how minor a needle poke is in the grand scheme of things that completely suck about having diabetes!!!"
I try to remind myself that people simply don't know what they don't know -- and there are millions of things that I don't know. It's good to hold on to humility about it; otherwise, resentment can creep in.
Very true about how insignificant needle pokes are, but when speaking to a non-D, you sometimes need to speak in a language they understand. And it is hard to understand that some people will never know what a 300 BG feels like, or how tough carb counting is, or how - even when you do everything right - things sometimes go horribly wrong.
I’m not sure if, by resentment, you mean resenting diabetes or resenting other peoples’ inability to “get it”, but as people with diabetes we’ve got to fight the tendency to do both.
Awwww, makes me sad to read all of these posts about parents checking their children several times a night and the reference to them as "helicopter parents" or whatever (first time hearing that term). My 6 yr old dtr was dx'd at 4 1/2 yrs old and I have checked her bg at 2am EVERY night since and sometimes more. She's very stable for the most part, has a great A1C, and can't really identify a low blood sugar. I think she has complained of feeling "wobbly" 5 times or less when she was actually low. We have caught some bg in the 40's in the middle of the night and there was no reason (exercise, sickness, changes in pump settings) to anticipate that. I checked her last night at 10p, 12p, and 2a. She was recently sick and her pump settings have changed quite a bit since then. She was in the 120's all night but I need to know that. I don't mind it at all because she's my little girl and I want her to be safe. Apparently it's just a handful of kids/adults who don't wake up because of a hypo but it won't be my dtr you read about. We have also caught highs in the middle of the night (for what reason who knows as we all know this disease can be unpredictable) and corrected instead of her sleeping all night at 300. Once she was 500+ so obviously her pump wasn't working. Injection, pump change, and back to normal. Got up, went to school in the morning instead of getting up and going to the hospital...... She is also well taken care of at school. Those assigned to her care to a VERY good job and follow the orders written by the endo. Yet, are very flexible "she's gonna have 6 M&M's in class this morning. do you want to bolus or just check her after recess". The answer is "let her have 'em and check her at her usual mid morning check" and they know this but they have to call anyway. The only time I go to school is to change her pump if it alarms. I hope this isn't being a "helicopter parent" :( but if it is I guess I'm okay with that.
Obviously I would rather have a cure than an AP but beggars can't be choosers so if an AP comes out then GREAT! But I'll still get up and check her at least once a night until she goes to college......
I was referring to resenting people who don't get it -- resenting diabetes is kind of a given, isn't it? Ha!
I do about five minutes of Type Zero education per week and call it good. Most of them just don't want to know -- it's just way too much information -- and I see no useful purpose in burdening them with fun facts about neuropathy, gastroparesis, retinopathy, DKA, etc. etc. etc.
As long as I have my fellow diabetes warriors to chat with and everyone near me knows to dial 911 if I fall down, I'm good.
I showed my new diabetic alert bracelet to my guitar teacher and I could see in his face that it made him sick with worry. Something you and I take for granted as just part of the territory was very distressing to him. Why needlessly burden them or shatter their innocence? I don't want him lying awake at night feeling sad about my blurry vision or endangered fingers. He's a sensitive soul and as far as I'm concerned, the less he knows about my diabetes the better.
I'd much rather he and I spent our time together talking about augmented 5ths, tremolos and the dotted eighth notes common in French Baroque compositions for the lute.
My daugther is 3,5 years old, 2 years type 1. Everynight 12PM, almost always 2am to see trend and insulin (long) tails and sometimes 4am too.
She surely doesn't feel low/high, she just sleeps and you don't know.
When I don't wake up, it's because she is high and I know I cannot correct her BG and recheck at 2-4 hours because I'm too tired, so I leave her BG as is.
We are under lantus, but I know parents using micro which do the same, 'cause you set lower targets and it's easy to run low (hormones up and down, played too much during day, the wind blows and whatsoever).
My be I'm an helicopter parent, but you would be either.
Maybe we need to start a Trekkie group????? :-) I have the complete set of the original Star Trek, and watched the complete Next Generation, too. Those were the days! :-)
I've read a number of stories of children with diabetes dying at night, and the impression I get is that they don't know exactly what is killing them. One mysterious thing is that they seem to be just asleep -- their pillows and sheets are not wet from sweat, and the bedclothes are undisturbed. I think this unknown factor makes it MORE scary for parents, not less, because you don't know if your child has this unknown susceptibility or not -- it could be a low accompanied by a heart conduction defect or something else, and no one knows.
So, I think every parent has to do what gives them peace of mind, because a child's life is just too precious to risk. And even then, no one can predict what's going to happen, so please take the time to love your sweet ones as much and as often as you can! :-)
