This all started last night. I finished a Lantus pen and threw it away. I noticed that my trash can was full, so I took out the trash and threw it into the dumpsters out behind my dorm room.
Fast forward to noon today. One of the RAs (basically students in charge of a residence hall) somehow found my used up Lantus pen sitting next to the dumpsters. IDK how it got there, but it somehow fell out of my trashbag. Anyway, the RA saw it and immediately thought it was a used heroin syringe.
She called the cops, and the ENTIRE residence hall got temporarily evicted and drug searched, Police, dogs,and everything! Eventually, a cop with a brain noticed that the “heroin” was actually an insulin pen. They were finally able to track it back and gave it to me. They told me to “be more careful,” then packed up and left.
I then went BACK to the dumpster and made sure the stupid thing made it into the trash this time! Needless to say, I screwed up quite a few people’s afternoon.
Oh my, @TimmyMac! What a story. I take it that the ability to READ isn’t high on the requirements for the job of RA (or admission to the college…) Lantus pens are clearly labeled “insulin glargine:”
Yeah, absolutely clueless RA. But congratulations on your oversight; I’ve always believed in going big or going home!
A non-diabetes related aside: my middle school daughter with T1D, who was in the high school marching band, had an un-freaking-defeated season and are State Champions! How did your marching band do?
We are a college band so we don’t compete. We just play to please crowds, not judges. We were in a parade to celebrate the release of “Bigstone Gap, the movie” and our school hosted a band competition that had 24 bands and over 10,000 people in attendance!
Did you leave a needle on the pen? And was it uncapped? I’m having a hard time seeing how someone would interpret a capped pen as heroin, or an uncapped but needle-free pen. If you left a needle on it, that’s a no-no just from a safety perspective. Proper needle disposal in a sharps container is a hassle, but especially in a communal living environment, perhaps something you’d consider out of respect for the health of your peers, or for that matter the janitors.
When I was in college I wouldn’t have been too stoked about a big biohazard sharps container on display in my dorm room. Chicks don’t dig it. I think a good compromise is something like a liquid laundry soap container to put pen needles in and then disposing of it properly— like maybe at the campus health center if they have one.
The pen was uncapped, (I always lose the things) but there was no needle on it. I might ask the school nurse later if she has a sharps container I can have though
Yeah, something like this happened to me a couple of months ago. My hot water tank wasn’t working and I called the landlord who sent the maintenance men out. I got the house all cleaned, hid my kitty, cleared out my utility closet (where the hot water tank is). They got here and I was standing near them while they were laying on the ground trying to figure out the problem. And then I saw it. A fricken syringe laying on the floor right next to this guy’s face! There is no way he didn’t see it. All I can assume is that the stupid cat got a hold of it and pushed it under the closet door. Oops.
Typical overreaction. It’s too bad your needle fell out of the bag, but surely closing the dorm and searching everywhere constitutes unreasonable search. If it doesn’t, it should.
There is a big scare on now about heroin. I guess its really cheap and many people are getting addicted. It was probably meant to be a learning/awareness exercise. I find it hard to belive an insulin pen was mistaken. They are so discrete. Perhaps a pen would be a good way to sell heroin if it wasn’t a powder like glucagon. A pen is not old school heroin. I had a housemate when Madonna was a new act ask me for a shooter. That’s what he called a syringe. He wined that he had to share with prostitutes. Of course I wouldn’t share my life saving apparatus.
