Levemir & Lantus

Type 1 and LADA Parents of Children with Type 1 Diabetes
#1

At the beginning of this month we reached our darling daughter's 2 year mark with Diabetes. She's almost 3.5 years old. She has been on Novorapid & Levemir since the beginning. Look, it's insulin so I'm not looking for the shiniest new thing but lately she is really high in the morning. Barely any hypos which is AWESOME but her numbers have been really high. Seems like there isn't any insulin reserve.

We saw her Endo today. We are upping her Levemir to 5 units at night. If we don't see any immediate improvements our next plans of action are as follows:
A) Giving her 5 units of Levemir right at bedtime (1.5 hours after dinner and her Novorapid injection)

B) Splitting the Levemir injections to twice a day.

C) Switching to another long-acting insulin.

So, my question(s). Anyone experience this? What did you do? Did you switch? Happy with the switch??

**Aside from some long-actings not really for children under 2, there was a reason I chose Levemir. I can't remember now since I was shocked beyond belief......20 weeks pregnant with baby #3...did I say in utter shock??!!

Thank you!!

#2

I've honestly never heard of someone using Levemir once daily, only twice. Have you considered pumping? My daughter is 12 years old and pumping; we've found the advantages too numerous to count!

You may want to join the forum "Parents of Children with Diabetes":

http://forums.childrenwithdiabetes.com/forumdisplay.php?3-Parents-of-Children-with-Type-1

#3

Type 1 in childhood is constantly changing because of the growth spurts. I hope you consider the pump and are able to get one. Otherwise, our endo claims Lantus much more stable than Levimir. You usually use Lantus once a day but many find better control using it twice a day and splitting the dose. She has been able to get around that by giving Lantus 8:30 p.m. and covering hours 6:30 pm thru 8:30 pm by using more Apidra for her dinner bolus. Her Lantus lasts 22 hours. Dinner is at 6:30 p.m. So it works out fine. P.S. She was on the pump from three months post-diagnosis until 17 years of age, when she no longer wanted to be attached. Lantus is not as good as the pump, IMO. And I could never have managed during puberty and teen years without the pump. With Lantus you can't temp basal up to use more basals for growth spurts.

#4

thanks for the responses. We will revisit the pump option again this Summer when we are back in the States. She’s very sensitive about anything attached to her. As it is, she will only let us do her injestions in her legs.

I’ll keep an eye on the Parents of Children with Diabetes forum.

Since writing this we did try the 5 Levemir at night and it was too much. She seems to be ‘normalizing’ for the time being.

#5

You want to watch out for lipodystrophy and lipoatrophy if you limit the areas you use for injections. Don't want to destroy any real estate you will need to use in the future!