I have been using the Omnipod for a little over a month now. It was wonderful at first. Up until the last 10 days anyway. Now I have been having extremely high blood sugars and am having a very difficult time getting them to come down.
I have not been ill, haven't changed my eating habits yet I have had to increase my basal dosages and also change my carb to insulin ratios to increase insulin at meals. Even this has not helped bring me closer to my target range. Just yesterday in the early afternoon my blood sugar was 487! I have not seen that high of a reading since I was diagnosed 5 years ago. Then again today after lunch, took my bolus 10 minutes prior to eating as usual, covered all carbs accordingly and still had a blood sugar of 409 two hours post meal.
I have had two occlusions, three pods simply fail without reason and have lost a ton of insulin. My PDM seems to be working just fine, haven't seen any issues with that. So I don't understand all this.
Does anyone have any suggestions for me? I called my Diabetes Educator and she just suggested I call Insulet. Who told me they do not replace insulin nor will they replace pods for occlusions. I haven't called them about the three pods failing without reason yet, I assume they will at least replace those. I saved them for reference of the lot #'s for when I do call. But what should I do in the meantime? I have had to take needle shots just to bring my blood sugar down from those ridiculously high numbers already. Considering going back to MDI.........not really wanting to though. :(
Did the insulin injections work normally? When I have as much trouble as your having it’s usually because I’ve got a bad bottle of insulin. If your pods fail within the first 24 hours or so you can withdraw the insulin and use it again. Most of us have been successful in reducing our insulin loss this way. It is also possible that your body is going through hormonal changes. My first 6 or 8 months on the pod were wonderful and then suddenly I started to develop a week and a half of super high sugars (basals needed to be increased 60% to keep them down) every month. We’re not sure why my hormones started this but once we figured it out we just set a separate basal pattern for that week+. Good luck figuring it out!
This is my first summer on the pod (actually any pump), and I have had problems for the last 3 weeks or so going hypoglycemic. I saw my CDE and she told me that some type ones on pumps need to change their settings when it gets hot or cold. We are having a heat wave here in NJ, are you in MN?
Have you had any vaccinations? The other problem I had about 6 weeks ago sent me hyperglycemic. I had a pneumonia vacination and my numbers skyrocketed. I was way over 400 by the next day despite taking huge (for me) correction boluses. I called my endo and got the doctor on call who had me take a 10 unit correction and temporarily increase my basal rate. I had to call back about 5 hours later and take yet another 10 unit correction. That finally did the trick. My CDE told me a vacination sort of gives you the disease. That makes sense to me. Three years ago I ended up first in intensive care for 6 days and then on the diabetes floor for another 6 days with pneumonia and hyperglycemia (about 1250). I’m happy that the pneumonia vaccine lasts 10 years.
The first insulin injection only brought me down slightly. I then took another bolus thru the pump and that brought me down at least into the 200’s. The second injection I took, which wasn’t until the next day, did work normally. However once I had a meal and bolused via the pump, my sugars increased dramatically again. All of this was from the same vial of insulin.
Speaking of hormonal changes, I do notice a need to increase my basal at that “special” time of the month. Which unfortunately is right now. But with this increase for both my basal rate (from 1.05 to 1.20) and my bolus insulin (from 13g carb to 10g carb), I think I shouldn’t be having these outrageously high sugars. I just bumped up my basal rate to 1.30 to see if that will help. If so, then I will also create a separate basal pattern for this lovely week or so. Thanks for the advice!
I know…it’s frustrating, isnt it? i think all podsters have been thorugh it…I frequently run into these kinds of problems whien the weather radically changes, or, as Brad indicates, I have some other form of 'shock" to the system. (Ie a vaccination, my numbers go whacky every yesr for about 3 days when I have my flu shot). I always go back to MDI whenever these things start happening…just for bolus, I leave basil to the pod, and check my bg every hour or so.
Another time, I did replace the vial of insulin I had been using (per Rebecca) and, sure enough, things got back to normal within 6 hours. the Pharmacy I have been using was great…they replaced the insulin instantly at no charge (a Walgreens).
Hi Brad, no we are not having a heat wave here in MN. At a comfortable 73 today. Thankfully. But thanks for the advice on the weather, because we definitely have topsy turvy weather here. : )
Have not had any vaccinations since fall. I too got the pneumonia vaccination which didn’t seem to affect me too much. I am sorry to hear you got so ill from it.
Sorry to hear you’re having such a rough patch with the pod. I had a picture perfect first month with my pod and then I started hanging out in the 200s a bit too often for me. Even though my basal rates and IC ratios were the same as the previous pump I was on, it was like they suddenly quit working. My CDE helped me tweak my numbers and recommended I bolus for meals (with Novolog) 30 minutes before meals. That seemed to help me a bit.
Are you using different sites than you were the first month? I’ve found I have to run temp basals with certain sites because they seem to have a different absorption rate.
Omnipod should replace the pods that failed without reason without any problems.
Sorry to hear the misfortunes you’re having. I’ve been on the Pod for a year and a half and sometime have the same trouble you’re having with ridiculous highs. What I have noticed, for me anyway, mostly has to do with the placement sites. The best places for me are on my stomach and arms, sometimes legs. I’ve noticed sometimes that when my hair starts growing back it will partially occlude the cannula hence not allowing the full amount of insulin to be administered…frustrating. When I replace a new pod I bolus 0.20 units to make my new placement aware of the pod, this seemed to have worked for the most part.
I just met with my Endo last week and we agreed, since I have hypoglycemic unawarenss, that I will be started on a CGM, Dexcom. I’m pretty stoked about that.
I’ve had diabetes for 34 years, except for 4 years that I had a pancreas transplant which my body rejected, and am so happy with new advancements with technology for diabetics but at the same time it’s frustrating when the devices do not operate 100% correctly.
That’s great news that you are going CGM. I have hypoglycemic unawareness too, and me Dex helps alot. I have it set to alarm when I go below 90 so I can catch a low in time. It is not perfect, but it helps me sleep at night knowing that if I go low, I’ll get an alarm and I can treat it. The last time I went low overnight (pre CGM) I woke up with 3 paramedics and 2 police officers in my bedroom, glucose intervenous and my wife a wreck.
Troy -
WOW, you are the second T1 I have ever heard of that had the Pancreas transplant and rejected it! The other is someone (one of my TU friends) who has posted her story on my site: http://www.supportersofsurvivors.com check it out…it’s eeerie that I have heard these stories so close in time! She also went 2 years with it, then “out of the blue” rejected it! I was supposed to go in for one a month ago, my wife talked me out of it when she read about adverse reactions to immunosuppressants, and I concurred and called it off. (seems like I made the right decision)! God Bless and PEACE!
My son has been on the Pod for just about a month now and we are nearly convinced we are going back to the shots. It dislodges at the least bump, it fails for no reason at all (we did 3 changes in one day) and he is tired of worrying about whether it is actually working or not. He’s 11 years old and scared to death he will go to sleep and never wake up. The troubles we have had with this thing are not making his confidence increase at all.We are also losing a lot of insulin with all of the unscheduled changes. Salvaging the insulin seems like a good idea but I’m not sure that it didn’t cause one of the failures. We are both very frustrated.
Hi Lori, just wanted to share my experinece with the Pod. My 3 yr old boy has had the pod for almost a year now. Yes, there have been complications (high readings, oclusions, malfuntions). In a year time, these sum up to 5-10 times at the most. The rest of the time, the Omnipod has worked fine, meaning it has delivered the insulin, not getting clogged or stopped working.
I think after the 4th or 5th month of using the pod is when we really started taking advantage of all its features. There are tricks you need to learn – we’re still learning more–, so research this site to learn them. We apply some of them AFTER discussing them with our ENDO. Give it a little more time to learn about sites, prebolus before placing a new pod, using alcohol, neosporene, rotation of sites, insulin temperature, type of insulin, etc, etc. Customer service has helped us a lot, but even more the suggestions learned here at tudiabetes… Best of luck.
The CGM has been a real game-changer for me. I love having realtime information. Even if it’s not reading exactly accurately, I at least know which direction I’m going. I’ve had it wake me in time to treat my lows that I otherwise would have slept through. The Dexcom and the OmniPod have really helped me tighten my control a lot.
Your poor wife. I’ve never lost conciousness – luckily. I’ve never had the privilege of waking up with my bedroom full of first-responders and an IV. That must be really, really disorienting.
Yea, she freaked out when she couldn’t wake me up. I was all sweaty, so she knew what the problem was and called for help.
My worst was when I was on a business trip dining alone, and woke up face down on the table. Another diner was sitting across from me; no one from the restaurant. That was when I was on MDI and no CGM. I ended up in the ER until 4:00 AM despite their telling me I would be able to leave by midnight. Made for an interesting day at work the next day.
I have been on Onmipod for about 2 months now and had some of the high issues. Your diabetes educator should be more helpful and I would keep calling or go through the doctor. I had to change my insulin to Apidra and that has helped me tremendoulsy. Evidently some insuslin can clog in the cannula??? I also have to watch my placement because for some unknown reason, my cannula wasn’t going in. Ask your diabetes edu about that too. My Omnipod sales rep told me they are looking in to lengthening it. The convenience of the pod system has been worth my trouble but it is a bit frustrating but then this is my first pump. Stay with it.
My son has been on Omnipod for just over a month and has had the same problems starting at about two weeks out. I think we had a lot of help early on picking sites, etc at our appointments and now we are on our own.
We hit muscle on the arm with one and have had several pods that occluded (one had just been put on his abdomen when he was sitting - a no no per Insulet) when he did the bolus but not during basal. We were not sure that he was getting the basal but he was not that high so some insulin must have been getting through. He developed an infection from covering a spot he shaved and was on antibiotics for two weeks. One would not take the insulin. Insulet replaced most of these (received them today in the mail) for us but only because it was our first call. They said they would not replace occlusions again but to call and they would try to help with placement. We feel like we are learning and that it will get better but I have changed his RX to every two days because so far we had used 16 pods for the month.
My son is very high after a pod change so we try to schedule that now before a food bolus. When he reaches the 300s (usually on school breaks when he is so sedentary), the only thing that helps bring him down is to walk slowly. Just more insulin does not help much - he seems resistant to it. His Dad takes him to a big box store and they walk around and look at everything a teenager dreams of having (laptops, video games, movies). He will usually drop into the 200s and then he can correct. I would not try this alone but if you have a friend willing to drive, it may help. This is not exercise really just browsing window shopping speed.
This week has been better. We have only lost one pod in the lake after extreme yardwork. The adhesive came off the pod leaving only the backing on his abdomen. Still have not lost any pods playing ice hockey which is amazing to me.
