Kennedy made the switch to apidra last week. Overall she is thrilled to be able to eat sooner, and her peaks are not NEAR as high! Pretty much know where her blood sugar is going to be two hours later, maybe will drop another 10 points or so after that but that's it.
using about 8% less insulin than before, from 21 units a day to 18, have left basal the same, now seeing ssome drops in the overnight, and running lower temp basals at night to keep her from dropping overnights.
What have podders experience been switching to apidra? Did you use less insulin? How does your third day hold out? Did you have to reset basals?
Did you post pod change blood sugar spike as high? ( hers was lower, it just seems to kick in much sooner on that new pod)
We are now having exercise low's that have been hard to control, turning basal way down and leaving her at 180 before dance, and she's still dropping to 50 by the end of class...
Anyone with insights on how apidra changed your pod regimen with exercise? turn basal down MORE? turn basal OFF maybe? Turn basal down sooner?
Call into endo today, but any and all insights appreciated!
I use Apidra in the pod and love it. In response to your question regarding exercise lows, do you know how much insulin is on board like from lunch or a snack bolus? When is dance class? I've done a bunch of dancing (modern specifically) with the pod and apidra (it seemed to work fine when I had very little insulin on board), and now regularly hit the gym @ 4pm after a nice walk from work to the gym and setting a 1/2 basal for about an hour. I do eat a snack often though too. I've heard (someone correct me if i'm wrong) that there is a natural blood sugar dip in the afternoon for most people. I've noticed this as well.
It's tough when the person with diabetes isn't in control of the physical activity. Meaning, although I sure hope her dance teachers are aware of her diabetes and allow her to stop/test/eat/etc when she feels the need, working out at the gym allows me more freedom to notice my body's cues (with low blood sugar) because I'm not attempting to pay attention to, say, the dance teacher.
That being said, I have confidence that you will figure out how to adjust to dancing :-)
No experience with Apidra. I gather that is a new type of fast acting insulin? Just in general, with exercise, my diabetes educator has told me to do a negative temp basal while the exercise is going on. That way, you are not doubling the effect from the exercise as well as receiving insulin. Just a thought.
We started a two vial test of apidra three days ago. Our daughter also wears a dexcom which should give us good information during the trial. So far the trial has been positive. Her blood sugars have been a straight line during the last two nights in the area of 120. She has had severe post meal highs which led us to take the trial. Her biggest spike is always after breakfast. She spiked this morning to just a little below 200 today which is 70 to 90 points below her normal breakfast spike. Someone brought pizza into her high school musical rehearsal this evening and her spike was only to 172.
We are cautiously optimistic about the trial so far. So far we have not made any adjustment to any of the pump settings. We certainly used less insulin in the first pod. I will post more results after we finish the trial.
Thanks, Larry, for the info. Good luck with the trial. I will be anxious to hear how it works for your daughter. PS beware the devil pizza! Keep checking this evening.
The highest spike last night was at 172 which I thought was excellent after pizza. Her rehearsal was 3 hours of practicing dance routines so maybe that was the primary factor which kept the devil pizza at bay.
I have been using Apidra for about a year and love it! I was on Apidra pens and now I use it in my Omnipod. I'm not sure about the details of it all but I did find I was using a little less insulin. I wasn't on the pod when I switched but I did lower my Lantus (not sure if it's related). I have been having problems with exercise but usually I drink a serving of juice before and leave my basal as normal. I check after an hour if I'm at the gym longer but thankfully I can still feel my lows. Sorry if that isn't that helpful but I hope your daughter gets it figured out- I know how frustrating it is to have consistent lows. I'm dealing with it now for other reasons...
