Hey, everyone. I love utilizing the temp basal feature to raise blood sugar without eating. It's the closest thing to not being diabetic and what will be tinkered with in the closed-loop system. But my question is, how much insulin is safe to go without? Generally, what I do is: temp basal at 100% for one hour, exercise 60 - 90 minutes. Then, usually it's around 80 post exercise. Sometimes, I go ahead and do another hour at 100%. I pretty much use it as a substitution for a snack whenever my blood sugar is borderline low. However, my doctor said to never go longer than one hour at a time. So, is one hour at 100% during the duration of the exercise a good practice? Thoughts and inputs, please. Thanks :)
When you say 100%, do you mean minus 100% (Zero Basal)?
Thanks for bringing this up--I should do more of this behavior rather than just eating to bring me into range.
For me it depends on the exercise, running -90%, biking -50% during the exercise. I resume after I am done exercising. I never really stop the flow of insulin, I think I understand your doctors point. If you stop more than hour, insulin is gone and you could go high and take longer to recover?
I do 50% less for 2 hours. I start one hour before exercise and then that leaves me one hour for exercise. Hope this helps.
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I do the same thing before exercising depending on mg BG. I was wondering if doing repeated zero basal delivery leads to more chance of occlusion because nothing is coming out of the cannula.
Completely stopping insulin is really not good at any time. Muscles require glucose for energy production which means insulin is needed to facilitate movement across the cell membranes. There are two types of energy production during exercise - oxidation or aerobic and anerobic. The first follows a normal Krebs cycle but the second converts glycogen to lactic acid. This acid is later burned with the use of additional glucose.
When you begin an exercise regemin you will find that blood sugar will drop very quickly. However, over time, with regular exercise the muscles adapt and use fatty acids instead, which means less is needed and less insulin as well. Of course neurons utilize glucose exclusively to insulin supply should never be zero.
IMO you should try to balance between moderate insulin reduction (50% and increased carb intake before and during exercise. This balance will change depending on conditioning of the muscles being used - the longer you have been exercising, the less additional intake will be needed. Type of exercise also factors in. The catabolic/anabolic cycles also require energy, especially with power training, for a rather long period after exercise and often reduce total basel requirements for 12-24 hours afterwards.
As is always the case with blood glucose you are trying to hit a moving target in the future while looking from the past
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Yeah. Like above never completely stop insulin. Don’t forget your cells still need to eat. Exercising just makes the process more efficient but doesn’t remove the need. Also know that most short acting insulins have about a 2 hour life in your body. Some faster though so consult your doc on the insulin you use.
My CDE that’s also a T1D
I work out in the evening (boot camp), so I eat supper and only count half my carbs. I then temp basal to -55% for 1 1/2 hours. My boot camp last an hour. This has proven very effective for me.
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My basal is at .05 from 1:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. What do you suggest doing for a low during that time? Most days I walk for 1/2 hour after lunch and dinner. I have been turning the basal off, usually for an hour at a time, since I can't temp less than .05.
In this case, I'd suggest adjusting your pre-meal insulin or diet to accommodate. Less bolus would leave more food in your system during the exercise.
I hit the gym 5 days a week and turn my temp basal rate to decrease to 95%. If you do 100% you will creep up sometimes with no insulin in your body and when you eat after the gym you will go super high and be miserable. -95% is the way to go.
Also I turn my pump off for 1 hour sometimes at night to get my BG's back up, that way i don't have to wake up totally and take in sugar. It's so great especially when i used to have to wake up and eat a bowl of cereal at 3a.m all the time.
For me, any basal rate adjustment I make will not kick in for a couple of hours. So, if I'm exercising at 5 and expecting to have a low at 5:30, I'd actually have to adjust my basal rate starting at around 3, anticipating that I'll be exercising a couple of hours later.
It's tough. So, really, my basal rates represent my overall state of conditioning. If I'm working out consistently, I will have to make adjustments to my entire 24 hour profile. If I take a break for a day or two, up to a week really, it doesn't have much of an affect.
For my workouts, though, I don't worry about adjusting my basals. I'll pop glucose tabs if I need them, or I'll take a carb load right before working out.
I was having too much trouble making changes to my basal rate on the fly.
Yes FHS you bring up a good point. Any change you make "now" to your basal really won't be "seen" (your body won't have an effect) for roughly 60-90 minutes. So if you're going to work out at 5 pm, you should at least change your basal by 4 pm. If you are going to work out at 5 and change your basal at 5, you're really not changing your basal during your workout at all, because that basal was already pumped on board of the last hour or so.