It works so well that as more people come to understand that they will more and more be demanding it from their doctors… and as more doctors start managing its use hopefully it will continue to be proven as safe as it is effective… I understand the reluctance of some doctors to prescribe something they’re not familiar with and that doesn’t have a long history… but every day there are new users, more reports of great success, more history of safe and effective use
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Was the “lung cancer” thing blown out of proportion? If I recall, one or more of the people who had lung cancer was a smoker.
Obviously the FDA doesn’t approve medications unless they believe the benefits outweigh the risk.
I personally am not even remotely concerned about any health risks… the FDAs expert committee voted unanimously to approve it without any warnings or pulmonary testing or monitoring, and only out of an abundance of caution did the FDA insist on ongoing observation just to ensure there were no trends developing of lung issues for users. The bases are covered. Those were the bureaucrats making those decisions-- the experts unanimously declared it safe…
But anyone who does have concerns should be reassured by the fact that everyone who’s using it is having their lung health monitored (just because it is a new medication-- not because it’s unsafe)… and we’re not seeing a bunch of people taken off it due to it causing any problems that I know of
Sam, you are right. More and more people are just starting to finding out Afrezza, including in this case, Damon Dash himself (Dash served as Jay-Z’s former manager and business partner and is best known as co-founder of Roc-A-Fella Records along with Shawn Carter and Kareem Burke. Damon Dash - Wikipedia).
https://www.instagram.com/p/BNw0LTuBX3G/
https://www.instagram.com/p/BNsPYDPBLwe/?taken-by=duskopoppington
My partner is currently in nursing school and just did the section on diabetes. They are taught briefly about Afrezza, but also that people don’t really use it/it’s been largely unsuccessful due to the respiratory issues (I told her what I know of people here using it with amazing results, although admittedly the respiratory issues are why I’m not currently looking into it myself). Her other education has been pretty much correct/up to date, so I think it’s an issue pretty specific to Afrezza, and it probably is concerning that practitioners are getting only that side of message.
I wouldn’t agree at all that it’s been unsuccessful… it was counter indicated for people with pre existing lung disease. IMO that is a long shot from being unsuccessful because of “respiratory issues”
I think it’s just a small growing company in a market dominated by huge players struggling to get the word out… that’s why there’s such a grassroots movement amongst users to spread the word
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I’m not saying that it is unsuccessful or that what they are being taught is correct—I’m just saying that’s what’s being taught in at least one nursing school, and if that sort of message is widespread (I don’t know), it’s not going to help with Afrezza’s popularity or Mannkind’s bottom line.
I do think it’s far too soon to understand the longterm risks from extended use, though I can absolutely appreciate why those potential risks would be tolerable for many for what seems like a great increase in quality in life! Besides, who knows how many years people will even be using it until something newer/better comes along (fingers crossed).
From the reviews from the Afrezza users in this group, it is the improvement in quality of life issues that are attractive to me. I don’t even mind the needles. I think it is the whole carb counting thing that wears me down.
It seems like if you eat carbs, you could use the 4 u. If you eat A LOT of carbs you may want to use 8u. Has anyone experienced a low while using Afrezza?
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I can have temporary lows if I take the Afrezza too soon after eating fatty foods that digest slow… where my bg will trend low then start climbing as it wears off… but it’s not hard to just wait until your blood sugar starts to climb to take the Afrezza or come up with a couple rules of thumb like take it 20 minutes after you start eating (that’s what I do)… it would be even easier with a cgm…
That make sense.
Fatty and high protein foods are addressed so so by novolog which is SO S-L-O-W. ugh.
I just inject and eat or start eating and inject now because it seems like for the type of food that I eat, the protein part must take a while to digest.
What are the insulin absorption rates for different injection sites? such as abdomen, thighs, hips? If I would like the insulin to kick in later (but not forget to inject) for the protein, what would be a good alternate injection site? I am thinking about experimenting with 2 injections at the beginning of the meal and would like some help. At the beginning of the meal I would like to have two injections, one to cover for the carbs and one to cover for the protein. One injection at a fastest absorbing site to cover for the carbs. At the same time, I would like to have another injection that will peak later to cover for the protein. Where would be good body parts to inject?
I mean, if you look at the trials it does seem “unsuccessful” in the sense that there are not mind-blowing reductions in A1C. But it seems clear that even the people involved in designing the trial didn’t really anticipate the best way to use it, so they designed the trials in a way that would minimize its benefit.
Reduction in A1C doesn’t address quality of life issues. Not having to count carbs would be a major improved! IMO. Something like that is difficult to quantify.
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I should have been in the trials then, I went from 8.1 to 6.0. So far… I hope to get it lower.
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In trials I think they had to follow preestsblisbed protocols that were designed for injected insulin-- which of course is stupid with Afrezza… and it still met the criteria of being “non inferior”.
If it’s non interior when being used totally inappropriately-- it’s pretty easy to imagine how much better it works when being used intelligently
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Sam19,
I’ve been interested in trying Afrezza, the speed and action profile sounds great. But the one thing I am not sure how to manage is the dosing. I think they are in 4 unit increments. (Not sure how that equates to Humalog, NovoLog, or Apidra).
How do you do it if you are eating an amount where you need 6, or 10, or something like that? My mealtime bolusing is usually done in precise numbers - like 5.3 or some oddball number like that.
Do you do Afrezza and supplement it with one of the other insulins? Like in my example of 5.3 units, would you do a 4 unit Afrezza puff, and then add 1.3 of Humalog or something?
Sorry, possibly a very dumb question.
In a nutshell you just round up to the next larger increment of Afrezza. Super easy. If you’d need 5 units of humalog you’d instead take an 8 of Afrezza for example… people have a hard time with this conceptually bc they are afraid they’d be taking too much but it just doesn’t work like that
It really doesn’t compare to everything you’ve learned about dosing liquid insulin. You just take a small, medium, or large dose basically… carb counting and dose calculations aren’t really necessary.
People (who’ve never used it) think that the dosing increments are limiting. In reality they’re entirely liberating.
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I just guess. You just have to learn to be lazy and quit trying so hard. Stop all this carb counting crap. 
After a few weeks you’ll know you need an 8 for certain size meal or correction. I almost always use 8’s. It does NOT equate to 8 units of novolog. And I almost always need another dose at 2 hours for a normal meal. When my cgm goes off at 130 I know I need another dose unless I took novolog with it.
Seriously you kinda have to unlearn the regimented stuff you do with novolog/humalog, carb counting, and all that. If I do take novolog with it then I do have to estimate carbs. There’s a big margin for error though, you just have to get in the ballpark. I can’t imagine doing it without a cgm though. Maybe that’s why I almost gave up on my first try until I got my Dexcom. My precious…
As I speak I watch my wonderful flat line graph after eating pancakes, syrup and eggs. REGULAR syrup. I’d have to bolus novo and hour ahead with way more than I needed to handle that spike. Ain’t nobody got time for that.
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Sounds awesome. I just gotta get it past the insurance so I can give it a try. Thanks for the info!
Oh, crap, I’m not all together today…another dumb question just popped into my head.
Can you use it for a small correction? Like if you had no plans to eat, but you were at 150, would a small puff work for that?
what’s your usual blood sugar range?