The first discussion I ever posted here on TuD was about switching to a pump after 37 years of MDI. I received a lot of great advice and eventually decided that MDI was still the right thing for me. But one does tire of injecting 5-6 times a day 7 days a week so I read with great interest a members post about the I-Port insulin injection port. Basically it is an infusion set with a septa into which one can inject insulin using a syringe or pen. It is waterproof and can be worn for 3 days. The company bills it as "the poor mans pump". The tag line "It takes the shots for you" is somewhat misleading but it's semantics.
I went on their website and since they would only ship samples to a doctors' office I contacted my CDE who happily ordered me some samples. The website has a comprehensive video of how to apply the device which I watched multiple times before actually getting up the courage to push the 2 buttons on either side of the inserter. Surprisingly it did not hurt at all. I wore the first port for 3 days and saved myself 18 injections during that time. The second port was also a success. I was beginning to think I could get used to not having to stick myself 5-6 times a day. The dexcom showed a nice flat line with my blood sugars never deviating too far from my target. Unfortunately the success was short-lived. The 3rd port which I placed on the back of my arm was an unmitigated disaster. I spent 3 days chasing highs and lows and wondering why my insulin was no longer working properly or was so erratic. Bad site, bad placement ? Your guess is as good as mine, but I don't want to have to guess. So I had one last port to try and I moved it back to my stomach having had good results twice before. Unfortunately this was another bad site or kinked cannula because yet again my blood sugars skyrocketed and needed to be corrected multiple times. I removed the port after just 1 day leaving a big black and blue bruise. I am now back to MDI. I have a fairly flat line on the Dexcom receiver for which I am happy.
So when the port worked it worked really well and I really enjoyed not having to inject myself 5-6 times a day. When the port didn't work well whether from poor placement or some other variable it just led to a lot of anxiety.
In a nutshell, for me the I-port had a 50% failure rate. Since these were salesmans' samples they didn't cost me anything besides a few nights uninterrupted sleep. But I can't introduce another variable like this in to an already complicated equation. Cos if it ain't broke....If I ever consider taking another injection vacation I might get some more samples but I doubt it.
I was interested in the Iport for a time as well. The devil is in the details and the Iport and pumps can't 100% solve the variable of getting placed in the skin correctly. Thus far I am having nearly error-free pumping by manually inserting angled infusion sets.