I really need your help. I was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes on April 8, 2013. My first doses (MDI) when first diagnosed is 10u breakfast, 10u lunch, 10u dinner, and 10u before bed.
At that time, I didn't encounter frequent of hypo. And, I also find it difficult to lower my blood sugar to the target range(hyperglycemia). And, now after 11 months of diabetes hypos become my problem. My endo has changed my insulin doses to 6u, 8u, 10u and 10u. But still facing frequent of hypos.
Just yesterday I may suffer from severe hypoglycemia because I fainted suddenly and rushed to the hospital. I am really worried because the frequency of hypos make all my activities become difficult. And, of course I'm an active person. I have discussed this with my doctor to reduce my insulin doses. But, no action taken by them.
So, the question is how do I avoid hypoglycemia and in the same time, to maintain my BS to target range?. My most recent HbA1C is 6.4.
hi lyna, wow, a hospital visit, thats not a good weekend!
its really hard to depend on doctors to sort out insulin because they see us for 30 minutes every six months. you will have more control over what happens to you if you learn to do it yourself! my doctors gave me the same advice at the beginning and i was having like three hypos a day and didnt know what to do! luckily my friend was diabetic and she told me about how I was in charge of my insulin, and then i found tuD.
most say that you should check to be sure if your basal(long acting) insulin is correct. to do this you have to do basal testing. you can do this over the course of a couple of days, fasting for up to six hours at a time to see if your blood sugar remains stable. if it does, that means you are ready to look at your meal time insulin.
it sounds like you are on some sort of permanent insulin doses for all of your meals. most people who take insulin on this site count their carbohydrates for every meal and have a personalised insulin:carbohydrate ratio. for example, my I:C ratio is about 1:25. this means that for every unit of insulin i take, i can eat 25 grams of carbs and within two hours, i will be at my goal post meal blood sugar.
everyones I:C ratio is different and you must be your own little science experiment to figure out what yours is. many people try a standard 1:15 ratio to start with. for every 15 grams, you add 1 unit of fast acting insulin. test after two hours and if you are at your target, you might decide to stay at that ratio. if you are hypoing, you might have to add more carbs for 1 unit. too high and you may have to lower the amount of carb.
there are some good books available, think like a pancreas by g. scheiner and using insulin by john (?) walsh.
im sure some more experienced people will be on here shortly to add their two cents and add anything i might have forgotten!
good luck and i hope you have no more hospital visits!
Until you sort it out, make sure you're testing frequently as possible and have a fast acting sugar source (glucose tablets for example) . Next of all , talk to your doctor about figuring out an insulin: carb ratio . The other poster really explained it well but seriously look into that, ask your doctor why they insist you take the same amount of insulin every day with meals when there might be different carb amounts in those meals and you're taking far too much? Like your i:c might be 1:15 carbs but if you're eating a 30 carb breakfast, 6 units would be 4 units more than what you need and most people drop quite a bit with extra insulin where that could be putting you into the dangerous low range (especially if you wake up with normal or on the low side fasting numbers) . Don't worry about your A1C right now, I know that's hard when there's pressure to be below a 7% and stay around 6.5% , but worry about the short term right now and get your insulin adjusted because it sounds like you're taking wayyyyy too much .
