I have had my OmniPod since February and I love it. My question is this: I am getting ready to travel via car for 3 days (7 hour car trip) and I am wondering how well the OmniPod travels in a suit case? I am only planning on being gone 3 days, so I will only take 1 or 2 pods with me (along with the backup pod and supplies I ALWAYS carry with me in my purse) and I was curious as to how I should carrt them? Do they need to stay in the box they are shipped in (and take the whole box of 10 with me) so they are more secure or is it ok to just put them loose in the bottom of my travel bag with the rest of my bathroom supplies? Or would it be better to find a small cosmetic bag that 2 or 3 will fit it with the rest of my supplies (insulin and test strips)?
This is the first trip I have taken since being put on the pump and I am anxious that all will be ok.
My other question is how stable does you BG stay while traveling by car? Do I need to do a temp basal for the duration of the car ride? if so, what is a good percentage to start with? Or should I just see how it goes and treat the highs or lows as they come?
I have relatives in Omaha, Ne. It’s a 4-5hr trip depending upon stops. I was gone this past Mother’s Day weekend. Thursday through Sunday afternoon. I always take 4 pods with me for such a duration. You NEVER know whether or not you will have a pod failure. I carry a cosmetic case for all of my toiletries and just toss them in there–no extra special care.
If I’m not driving, I just test as usual (6 times a day plus just before bed.
You might want to take 2 for every anticipated pod change PLUS 1 just in case. I just had 2 pods in a row fail.
I keep extra pods/supplies in a small bag that I can toss into my suitcase when traveling (whether driving or flying). I keep extra syringes, alcohol wipes, etc, in here too. No you don’t need to keep them in the original box. The individual pod containers are pretty resilient, so there shouldn’t be any issue for you. I usually carry plenty of spares, just in case there’s some sort of major error where multiple pods failed for some reason (which hasn’t ever happened, thankfully).
Re: your BG question, I think this depends on a lot of factors. Just driving for fun? No, I don’t adjust basal rates. Traveling w/ extra stress (For business or for triathlons/races in my case), then yes, sometimes it requires increased basals b/c of the increased stress hormones. When driving on long trips I typically like to munch on stuff (helps me stay engaged and awake, etc). I try to bring healthy food w/ me, but this is not always the case…so I have to watch BGs much closer when I’m constantly stuffing my face with food I would go w/ your gut to “see how it goes and adjust as needed”.
As far as wearing your pod, you might just want to keep in mind the location of your pod w/ respect to your car seats. i.e. if you wear on your lower back or top of your butt, will it be in a comfortable spot for a 7 hour drive? Or should you put it some other place that won’t cause as much of an irritation issue. This isn’t necessarily a major item, but something I would think about nonetheless.
Thanks for the tips. Usually I wear my pods on my stomache and depending on which side, sometimes the seatbelt rubs across them. We fixed this by just putting on an adjustable seatbelt holder that slides up and down the seatbelt. Then the shoulder belt wont rub my pod. We travel short distances quite a bit (the nearest 2 cities to us are 45 and 60 miles away) and usually do not have any issues, but this is the first long distance (longer than 2 hours) trip we have taken.
Thanks for the info. I won’t worry about making special arrangements to carry them. i will just toss them intio my “bathroom” bag. I will plan on taking 4 pods, “just in case”. I have not had one fail until yesterday when I went to do a pod change, and I never got the two beeps after filling it.
It’s quite easy to travel with the Omni Pod.
During the summers for the past 2 years we have traveled by car for over 2 months. Pods stay fine in the car…Insulin is fine in our cooler, IT’S NO PROBLEM. I bring enough pods for 3 months…
I have traveled by plane as well…no problems with security either.
Renea- I don’t have anything to add to your question but wanted to give a shout out to a person living in Laramie. I lived there from 7th grade all the way through my undergrad. Not many times you see or hear from someone from Laramie! How’s the wind?
Renea, just in case you haven’t been told or read this, you should fill the pods slowly. I can’t count how many have failed to beep after filling and no one suggested that this may help with that problem. I haven’t had it happen since. Seems to me one of the reps at Insulet should have mentioned that by now when I called for replacements!
I would take at least 5 extra pods. I have had a string of 3 all “fail” during priming, which is actually usually a diagnostic shut down, the error code ends with 64. and when i took only 2 for an overnight surgery, luckily the 2nd one did not fail…Murphy’s Law at it’s best.
To be safe, we always pack 3 times the number of pods that we think that we should need. You never know when you can run into a string of occlusions. For example, 3 out of the last 4 pods have had occlusions after only one day or so. The pods seem to travel well for us.
I would go w/ your gut to “see how it goes and adjust as needed”.