Opened a brand new lantus pen tonight. My last new lantus pen. After shooting the first 10u into my assflab I fumbled and dropped it onto my brick kitchen floor… It had the cap on and the cap didn’t even crack so it was almost an afterthought to even open it and look-- but inside the pen itself was shattered and spooging lantus all over the place…
So a couple thoughts…
I added it up, and am glad to see that it doesn’t appear I have any reason to fear insurance issues with refilling early because insist have gotten this box a little early— the number of units and the number of days add up to me being due for a refill
2). I have been dying to try levemir. I got a single pen sample from my doctor a long time ago… This incident prompted me to look at it again and see that it expired 9/2015. I am actually really interested in trying it, after much research I think it might be a good fit for me— I’m wondering what the general consensus on trying it with it 3 months expired is? With other meds I wouldn’t hesitate a bit but I know insulin is a bio med and it’s not the same thing… Although I’ve used pens far beyond 28 days (kept in the refrigerator) and never noticed one bit of reduction in efficacy.
One of my levemir pen´s little wheel mechanism wouldn´t turn, so I couldn´t dose or get any out. I took it to the pharmacist to see if they could do it, they couldn´t. So my doctor just upped the dosage on my continual prescription so that I would be able to get more earlier.
I would try the levemir and see what happens. When I switched to levemir because lantus stung every time I injected and it is great, for me, at least. No burn, very even throughout the night. When I told my doc I wanted to try it, she said, Oh but you will have to do two injections, then. But two injections that don´t hurt at all instead of a burny leg for half an hour is way better.
The only thing I found with the change was that I had to up my dose-I was taking 4 units of lantus at the time and had to take like 6 of levemir-did not seem to be as strong? weird. So if you do try the expired levemir, just be aware that it might seem like it is not working, but you might need more.
I much prefer Levemir to Lantus - because of the sting (Lantus). For me, the dosing was the same; however, Levemir only lasted 16-18 hours for me. Splitting the dose helped me with that, and was not a big deal, as Lantus also didn’t quite make it to 24 hrs (more like 20) and needed split dosing, anyway. Like everything else - take a bit of experimentation to know what works best.
I was considering starting out with levemir only once daily… Because I tend to run lower in the evenings with lantus even though it theoretically should be wearing off by then…
I just don’t seem to need near as much in the evenings… Maybe can benefit from the shorter duration of the levemir
As for the question of trying it with an expired pen, I personally would not. Here’s why:
If I inject expired insulin, there is the possibility that it may not be effective. No sweat, my meter will tell me that it’s not working, and I can just toss it and open a fresh one.
HOWEVER. This is a different scenario. If I were trying a new insulin I had never used before, AND it was expired, AND it appeared not to be working, then I would have no way of knowing whether the lack of performance was (1) because the insulin was expired, or (2) because that type of insulin just wasn’t effective for me. The situation would be ambiguous.
Pancreaswanted,
Have you tried switching out the tip…? Sometimes, ok once in a blue moon, that has worked… worth a try. Had that problem with all the pens I the past couple years. The original ones never… now… ugh.
