Medtronic just failing :(

Hi all,
So I'm a bit worried. My Medtronic (which is about 4 years and 2 days old) just failed while I was putting in a new battery. Just blank screen. Tried a few new batteries, and you guessed it, nothing. Just a blank screen. Thankfully I still have my old one, so I booted it up (with one of the same batteries I had just tried) and it thankfully worked.

I set it all back up, but now I don't know what to do. I'm on hold with Medtronic (which we all know will take over 30 minutes), but I was curious what you guys thought. I ended up trying one of the batteries again, and it came back on. Made me reset the time, but the rest is good. It seems to be working, but now I'm worried it's not going to.

Any thoughts? I figure I will use the old one for the night, just in case. But it really frustrates me that the thing just pooped out.

When mine failed, I've called them and they'd sent me a new one but the warranty might be 4 years. I called before that to get it arranged. I hope they can do that for you.

Yeah mine is a few days past the 4 year replacement. I have my old one, thankfully until I get a new one. So frustrating.

I don't have a pump, but like lots of battery powered equipment it sounds like the battery contacts may be slightly corroded. Clean them off with a pencil eraser or brown paper and it might be fine.

Exactly what I was thinking. I have seen some discussions that battery caps for pumps can get broken/damaged and cause signifigant problems. I suggest taking a good look at the battery cap and discussing that with tech support.

Yep that was actually the first thing I did as I've had issues with the cap in the past. I like the idea of a pencil eraser for cleaning it.
It turned out to be a coding issue. You can't change the insulin when the battery is getting low (like right before it warns you). If you do so it shuts off the pump. Thankfully it clears itself after 10 minutes or so. So word to the wise...if your battery is getting low, change it before you change your insulin.
I'm back to use the "newer" one, but still don't have complete faith in it, which scares me.

Also - if your battery alarm beeps and you don't change it for a while (not sure how long the "while" is, but let's say several hours), when you DO go to change the battery, the pump may not function and you will get some weird error message. This happened to me once, and after trying two new batteries and even buying another package of new batteries, I called Medtronic and they walked me through resetting the pump so it would accept the new battery. Wish I could be more specific, but this happened many months ago and I don't remember the details. What I do remember is this...when the low battery alarm goes off, change it immediately!

Ruth

Thanks, Ruth. It hadn't given me the low battery alarm yet. That's what I was waiting for to change the battery, little did I know priming would kill the battery at the right time and shut the pump off. It appears to be an error in the coding of the pump. You can't be in the process of priming when the low battery alarms appears as it shuts the pump off.

I have heard about this and even encountered it to some extent when I was using a Medtronic 722. I would put a new battery in after removing the old one and the pump just wouldn't do anything. I called Medtronic about it and their advice was to wait about 5 minutes after removing an old battery before putting a new one it. I was skeptical, but I'll be darned... It worked!

I have not yet encountered such and issue with the 723 I am currently using.

There is a capacitor in the pump that is there so you do not lose your settings etc when you change the battery. You will not reset the pump until that has had chance to completely discharge. Electronics sometimes do those sorts of things. Your pump should be ok to use. But hey!!! You could be ready for a new one if you still have insurance. That could be a good thing I would think. MY insurance lets me get a new pump every 4 years, but there is a way to get one sooner.
If you change your insurance plan even slightly, then it resets your limits.
Like if you change your deductible or co pay or if you added someone etc.

I only got my latest pump in January, but since I changed my plan two months ago, I could get a new one if I wanted to. I still have to pay the 20%, so I'm not going to do that nor do I need to.

Still it is a nice thing to know when your pump comes out of warantee and maybe your insurance is not ready to get you a new one

That always seemed like magic to me. I was like "OMG, I have to take the battery out, what will happen?!) but knew, probably from some guitar message board or something, that there must be a capacitor in it.

I’m having similar issue with my Paradigm that just went out of warranty. I change the battery and the pumps resets. After putting in the new battery it counts down (6-5-4-3-2-1) and then makes me reset the time,date and alarm settings. Weird thing it keeps my basal settings. Making me nervous.

seems like a bad battery cap, not making contact with the battery