I am starting to think my next pump may not be MM.
Thanks Dark Cloud
For a few days I went back to shots… I called my doc to get a new Rx for the FlexPens. I picked them up @ the pharmacy today. Ins. company paid $55 for one of the boxes and a bit more for the other one. I ended up paying more than $200 for a box of Levemir pens and a box of Novolog pens… :S
So I am back on the pump: I will stick to the pens as a backup in case of pump issues (since my pump is out of warranty now).
As for my replacement sets, I haven’t seen the same issue with the adhesive that Pavlos mentions BUT I have honestly not seen great numbers either.
Bad bloodsugars on pens? Grass is not greener on the other side? I am in debate mode daily about this. I sometimes feel all my bgs lows are from constant fast acting insulin in my system all the time, but the ease of the pump prevails.
Actually… my issue is financial. 
I simply can’t afford to fork that kind of money every month. I have to put a call in to the insurance company but not before I talk to my endo: it makes no sense… well, it does… well, you know what I mean! 
I am past due for endo visit, but did a A1C through my internist and it was 6.7, so I was happy.
Use to be a years wait to get into my endo now they have called me twice in the last two days because I am past due, but really it is a pricey A1C right now for me. I am thinking endo’s are suffering with the economy as well.
I will see him maybe end of October to get all new Rx’s and will talk of pens/shots at that time and my fast acting insulin theory. 
Diabetes is such a burden financially and to have MM add this extra anxiety is not a fun ride.
Take care all
I am more even-minded now about MM. When I first got involved with them they were so spectacularly wonderful that I could honestly say they were the best company of any kind, in any area or market I had ever dealt with in my life. Since the recall, however, things have changed and gone down hill. So now I neither love em nor hate em.
Lesson learned: Change sites every 2-3 days, don’t return recalled products lest they are malfunctioning for me
haha
I had no idea until you wrote it out.
I agree with Dave, we don’t have a ton of choices. Make sure if you really think you want to change to another pump brand that you do the research on what features are important to you and ask to try before you buy. Sorry you have had so much drama with the infusion sets. I imagine that has been so frustrating for you!
yar, and choices are even more restricted with insurance involved and you are stuck with one for the warranty period. if the pump itself is doing well and they are willing to work with me on supplies that have problems (just swapped out 3 boxes of silhouettes, opened a new box from that shipment (all same lot) and went thru 5 sets in 4 days) and they swapped them all out. Support is not really an issue, the returns dept can be troublesome tho, when they are involved I ALWAYS follow up with them until I have replacements in hand. And lord knows the billing can be a problem. It sounds bad, but with a little attention, it has been worth the effort for the results I have gotten. Nothing worthwhile is without some issues
I’m not switching, or even thinking of switching, pump companies. I’m also not blaming MM for this. Not that they don’t have their fair share of blame here, but by reading some of the replies here I’m realizing that some of my problems have been my own fault. Besides the adhesive not working properly on the first set, the elevated BGs and the pain are probably due to the fact that I was leaving my sets in so long that I caused an excess of scar tissue to build up and then happened to insert the new sets right into that scar tissue. If that’s the case it should explain the BG and the pain. The first set had bad adhesive (ok, it happens I guess) and because of that the cannula probably moved around a lot which resulted in tearing my skin (probably while sleeping on it and applying pressure in a vertical motion).
MM though should have handled the recall better. I’m guessing that they underestimated how many Lot 8s would be returned to them and now can’t keep up with demand for replacements.
I guess it’s just one of those coincidental situations: I received a new box of sets and with the second one out of the box began using bad sites. I didn’t realize I could have bad sites this fast so my first reaction was to blame the product.
As for insurance companies, they’d probably laugh in my face if I told them I want a new $6,000 pump from another company. They had to pay for this pump only one month after I signed up with them so they are already losing tons of money on me
I left my last insurance company in a similar situation. Just before I quit my job and lost my insurance my wife had a baby so I left them with a bill slightly over $10,000. Serves them right though. Five years I spent paying them almost $1,500 a month for insulin and supplies that cost them a monthly total of $350.
I’ll stop here though because if I get on the insurance topic . . . well let’s just say that anyone who likes our current Health Care system will end up with hurt feelings if they read my thoughts on the subject.
Please don’t draw me into that debate!
I’m in agreement that the lot 2’s that I’ve received is NOT of good quality. First, I’ve had a “no delivery” alarm 5 times on 3 different sets. I’ve never had a “do delivery” alarm previously. I’ve had to re-prime my pump several times and don’t quite understand but can see the problems never happened with the lot 8"s. (Maybe the system actually works now to let me know that the delivery is not taking place?) I’ve heard some folks kinda defending MM. I’ve NEVER heard of a medical recall that got ZERO publicity! Let a pacemaker have a malfunction of 1 in a million and it’s on the national news for weeks! MM did do a GREAT job of keeping the recall “hush hush” to the media. (and to us for several weeks) They probably learned their lesson from prior foul-ups on other devices they had to recall. It took WEEKS for them to notify me of the recall. To me, that’s unsatisfactory. I learned about the problem from this site (Thanks TUdiabetes). It really makes me wonder how long they knew about the problem and how much wagon circling they did prior to their announcement. I know it’s a lot of trouble to announce a recall and restock but I know they could have spent a little more time and money to put out the word and new product. (Sorry but you may have to pay some overtime to hard working folks!) I think they have a obligation for all the money they make to shift resources to this recall. It also seems like a good business decision to satisfy their customers due to the competition thats there and in the pipeline. If they were manufacturing a car and 1% of the brakes failed, the American public would be outraged! I guess us T-1’s don’t matter as much! At least that’s the way I feel. I appreciate having the pump technology and all the effort MM put into developing a potential life saving technology but for all the thousands I’ve paid you’d expect a little respect and promptness. What I see here from a lot of the site member comments is a total loss of confidence with MM. It will take a lot to re-gain that confidence from many of us. I’d like to apologize for my “rambling” and “venting” but I’m very disappointed with MM and certainly expected a better, more timely response. P.S. MM never did say if any of us died from the set problems? (I really hope that did not happen).
Somewhere on Tu, I read that someone had passed from a low bgs being on the MM pump and using Lot 8.
Cannot find it though.
I agree with you to a certain extent, but unfortunately companies in this country (and others) don’t operate like that (like you mentioned with the car brakes). It’s all about money, always, always, always! They have specialists who make recall decisions based on the money. I forget the exact formula used in calculation, but the essence is this: what costs more? Recalling and replacing a defective product or settling lawsuits by family members of the victims. If the recall is more expensive, then it doesn’t happen and it stays quiet. This is one of the reasons I am inclined to not lash out at MM since 2% of all manufactured products being defective is such a small number that other companies (car companies especially) would never even consider a recall. In capitalism everything has a monetary value, even your life. Nobody runs a for-profit company to save lives or help people. The bottom line is always profit . . . that business 101.Side note: one of my former colleagues (he was in the business school) always started the semester in intro to Business Management with this question: Why do companies exist? If any Business major answered anything other than “profit” my colleague would strongly advise him to change majors. For a couple of semesters he actually dropped the student one letter grade regardless of his performance later in class based on that answer alone. Eventually the complaints piled up and he was forced to change his policies. Anyway . . .
On principal I agree with you, but the capitalist business model has no room for principals and morals. Fortunately we at least have some oversight when it comes to child products, though it’s not really needed since a company that kills kids goes under fast and forever, a company that kills adults can survive through restructuring, re-marketing, re-branding etc.
Pavlos, I agree with Dave in that Sure-T’s might be more comfortable. I have on ocassion injected my set into a vein, resulting in blood in the cannula. Your problem sounds like something else is going on with your sets. I have also noticed a lack of adhesive on the newly issued lot #2 sets. I had a serious problem with the lot #8 sets. I was not able to get MM to talk with me about the problem. Good luck!
Yeah, I’m really starting to consider them now (the Sure-Ts). I checked the MM website and it’s funny how little they publicize them. You can get all kinds of info on their other sets, but Sure-Ts look like they are a deep dark secret for them. My only two problems with them right now are the length of the “cannula” (I use 9mm and Sure-Ts seem to only come in 6 mm, don’t know how much of a problem that would be for me), and the fact that they don’t come with an “inserter.” I know that after nearly 15 years of sticking myself with a steel needle I shouldn’t be worried about doing the same with the Sure-Ts but I can’t even make myself do it manually with the Quicksets. I’m also worried a bit about having a steel cannula in me all the time (with no flexibility) but I’ve read plenty about how it doesn’t seem to be an issue for people using them. I do, however, have a very active 10 month old girl who is constantly playing with my tubing (tugging on it) and kicking my infusion set with her feet when I hold her, so I’m worried that with less flexibility this might be more of a problem with the Sure-Ts.
I’ll probably end up asking for a few samples and try them out here soon. My big shipment is coming soon though, so I’d still have to go through that shipment before I could make a permanent change.
By the way, I changed my set last night since it was day 2 (no longer going to keep them in 5-6 days) and the infusion set at first refused to attach to the quickserter. I had to manipulate it and jam it in to get it to work (another problem with the replacement sets???).
I am a convert from the Quicksets to Sure-T’s. I used the 9 mm cannula before, and I seem to have no problem using the shorter one. I am far from thin. The concern with the little ones playing, is a legit one. I kind of have the same issue with the Sure-T’s. What I am doing is not attaching the detach point to my body. I just fold over the tape and now I pretty muhc have a 23 inch tube that has flexibility. My son’s foot got snagged a couple of times between the insertion point and the detach point. Luckily it did not rip off.
They are also really easy to put in. Pretty much pain free for me. Just stikc them in. I don’t even think about it. I think you will like them Pavlos. Get the samples. They should ship them to you via two day delivery.
I had general problems with quicksets and kinking…all incidentally lot 8’s. After getting samples of Sure-T’s from MM I switched and couldnt be happier. I had one box of lot 8’s that were swapped with 2’s…but I’m not in a hurry to use 'em. Let us know what you think of the Sure-T samples.
Dark Cloud , I have great , great difficulty reading your responses …I am English Second Language …a true Dutch Gal by heart …I will stop reading your responses and continue using MM as I have for the past 8 years and doing better NOW than on 4-5 needles daily before pumping . Besides I think , we are totally off the topic Pavlos created on August 3, 2009 .
sorry to say that if your are leaving your site connected for more than 3 days you are opening yourself to possibly a infection of sorts. Celulitis
My lots 8’s failed to let my pump put insulin in, a lot of no delivery alarms, Change out site more times then I care to mention. They are going to dole out supplies as a on needed basis, A box of 10 should last 30 days if you are changing every 3 days, so the shipments will be allotted gradually, until they step up manufacture… I sent back 58! and they said I may not get caught up until October!
Good luck to you, I cannot use my stomach due to the fact that I exercise and sweat so much that the site always falls out too soon!
I think that would be a good topic…what are your favorite sites or your best site,what do you think?