For my fellow podders out there…would the Omnipod alert if it wasn’t delivering insulin? My BG is slowly creeping up. I took a correction so I’m waiting to see if it comes down. But I’m just wondering if I would know if I wasn’t getting insulin.
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@gsmergss I was having absorption problems for months and was never alerted via OmniPod that there was a problem. I just kept watching my numbers go up and up.
I also didn’t know about tunneling then. If you don’t know about tunneling, it is when the insulin isn’t absorbed, it comes back out of the pod or pools under the skin. Here too, I never knew why my pods were wet and bloody when I took them off and I never asked anyone about it. I was able to put two-and-two together after reading several posts here and elsewhere. I changed where I generally placed my pods, which was on my belly, to my thighs, arms, or hips (not a favorite place). I also had tried my calf, not good. The insulin pooled under the skin and created a hard, painfull mass that had to be lanced.
Along with changing where I placed the pod, I also started using the pod for basal only. I bolus for meals and corrections with an injection (MDI). I no longer have wet bloody pods; absorption has been greatly improved!
Best of luck to you!
Here are a few articles on tunneling:
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In general it will, but not 100% of the time. I had a pod failure yesterday. Delivery didn’t stop completely, but it also wasn’t working (I can tell because I did a 14 unit, death defying correction around noon, and my BG didn’t drop.
I always wish that I was better at recognizing these failures earlier. MY CGM also failed at the same time. It was an odd day.
Its possible that there was internal tunneling. I had a SEVERE Low overnight - from 1am - 2:30am, when most of these corrections should have been already absorbed.
What day are you on the pod, and what type of insulin do you use?
Turns out it was in fact delivering insulin, it may just be that this site doesn’t absorb as well as my other sites. It’s my first dayish on this pod (less than 24 hours) and im on novolog.
A first day issue might be the activation thing. Where it sometimes takes a while for the insulin to start working on a new site.
I am not sure, but I think I mentioned this to you before on a different thread, the “activation” bolus.
But not sure if that applies here. That usually would only be an issue for the first few hours.
I have this problem now and then. I try to crank up basal a bit after a pod change. I also try to see if I feel leaking, but since I out some tape down I really cant tell. I too think I have scar tissue and maybe need to move the thing around somewhere else.
I think I only had a pod shriek at me once because of being dislodged. My site/pod failures are only caught by BG’s going up, sometimes slowly and sometimes fairly quick. Now if I go above 180 after a pod change I change it out, maybe even 160. I seem to have spots that don’t absorb well and those are slow creeps. But because I don’t go above 160 very often anymore, unless I knew I really guessed at a meal I chalk it up to a bad site or bad pod and change it out pretty fast. One time there was blood pooled, one time insulin, but all the rest nothing was noticeably wrong.
When I change my pod out because of an issue I give myself a shot to make sure I am getting insulin immediately. That way at least I know for sure the climb will be stopped in an hour.
That seems like a good method. For me right now if I’m under 200 that’s good. I tend to hover around 140-170 at the moment and that’s a lot better than it was so if I start creeping up over 200 for no reason I’ll probably resort to that method.
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