Okay, this may be a dumb question… I just started podding and I knocked it off my arm on day 2. I know people have complained about the wasted insulin when this sort of thing happens. Is there some reason I can’t just put a syringe back in the fill port, draw the insulin back out and inject it into a new pod??? I’ve got about 100 units I don’t want to throw out.
Sorry if this has been discussed before. I didn’t see anything when I was looking through here 
Different folks have different opinions. If you’re constantly drawing insulin back out and then mixing it in a bottle of new insulin to fill up a whole pod when you stick the new one on, after a while the insulin in that bottle is going to be compromised. Part of this is because that insulin has been exposed to your body temperatures for x amount of time, rather than being refrigerated…and no matter what type of syringe you use to draw it back out, that port’s not “sterile” any more…so some ppl have issue w/ that. After a certain amount of time the internal workings of the pod do not permit you to draw out the remaining insulin (I’m not sure if it has to do w/ where the plunger’s at in relation to the port, or something else…
If the pod’s been on less than 24 hrs, I definitely try to draw insulin back out. As long as you haven’t spent the last 23 hrs in the sauna, I don’t think it’s a problem.
On a separate note not sure how it got knocked off, but I realized after I started wearing pods on my arms just how close to the edges of doorways that I came. I hit the pod who knows how many times as I rounded the corner into a room Good luck in adjusting to the pod, and with getting that precious insulin back out!
I’m one of those people who thinks it’s a bad idea to withdraw and re-use insulin after the first day. Honestly, 100 units is only 10% of a vial, and it’s just not worth risk, however small, to me.
I’ve only done that after 1 day of use. I don’t like to waste the insulin either but I’ve done it several times in the past year and never had a problem. The insulin always worked well in the new pod, never got sore or infected. I also asked my doctor and he said I could do it with no problems. Good luck.
I go back and forth, sometimes choosing to leave the insulin in the pod, sometimes not. For me, it’s a matter of how frustrated I am in the moment. LOL. If I have less than 50 units in the pod, I don’t bother removing it. Even in a brand new pod, I have trouble drawing out but about 75% of what I just put in it.
Thanks everyone! It sounds like I’ll just attempt to reuse if it’s a day or less then. Might have to give it a whirl today as this pod is starting to peel off my stomach now! I’m headin to the pharmacy as we speak to try and throw this bad boy a lifeline (get some tape).
I’ve done it on day two with no problems 3 or 4 times but try not to. It depends on how low I am on Humalog. I would definitely not do it in the summer time when the insulin may have gotten a bit hotter while in the pod. To not mix with the insulin in the bottle, just inject air into the bottle first, then draw out the insulin you need to fill the pod. If you get bubbles in the syringe, get a pen or something to rap the side and move them on up so you can squirt them out.
Yeah, I definitely don’t want to inject it back into my good vial. I was thinking of saving one of my empty ones just for this purpose. Then I can use a normal syringe to take it out of the bad pod, put it in the empty vial, draw out half the insulin (from the 'good" vial) with the new pod syringe and then draw up my “recycled” insulin for the other half. …geezus. Now that I write it, this sounds ridiculous. I should just call it a loss! haha
ooops, my Pod just started beeping to change it. I tell people I’m a human alarm clock. lol
When you inject insulin into a new pod it gets rid of all the air bubbles and if it can’t you won’t be able to use it so don’t worry about that. And if by chance any air bubbles inject into your body it’s only going into your skin (fat), not into your veins or arteries so it won’t hurt you.
I recover my insulin if my pod won’t prime, or if it fails in the first hour or so. I would also try it after the first hour if I were not home and didn’t have enough “new” insulin to fill a pod. I had two pods occlude the same day once, and I didn’t try to recover the insulin the second time just in case the recovered was causing the problem (in hindsite, very unlikely).
I just had a pod fail at prime yesterday! I’m having a tough first week of this but determined to make it work! lol
Hang in there… maybe a few pods will fail but the majority of them will be ok.
hey misschievious! (sp?!) thanks for starting this…i had the same question and thought i saw a post about it. my pod is super sore right now on day 2 and i want to take it out but don’t want to waste the insulin. alas. i guess i will wait to see if my numbers start going crazy!
i have only been on the pod a few weeks now (switched from minimed) and one day went through 4 pods with all different kinds of errors! my trainer told me to call insulet and they would replace them. they replaced 2 of the 3 bad ones and had me send one of them in for their engineers to look at.
on the positive side of things, having diabetes is such a great opportunity for us to practice things like patience! eep.
I’ve been using the OmniPod for just about a year and had just a few bad ones. I always withdraw the insulin and put it in a new one and it works fine. I’m sorry you’re having so much trouble. I haven’t had a bad one in months so please, like you said… be patient, it’s really a fantasitc device.
Your insulin prescription should be written for a quantity of insulin that takes into account insulin lost from insulin pump use. It’s a bit frustrating to lose some insulin, but the risks posed by infection, clogs, etc. are just not worth it. The only time I withdraw insulin from a pod is if there is a rare startup error with the cannula or a rare painful insertion.
I am glad that when I withdraw insulin from a vial and inject it into a pod, it know it’s sterile insulin. If my pharmacist handed me a vial of insulin but warned me that it wasn’t sterile, there is no way that I would even consider using it. I know we all take liberties with sterile procedure (I think the last time I used an alcohol swab before pricking my finger for a blood sugar was…never), but I think that withdrawing insulin from a spent pod and the inevitable contamination that will occur is just not worth it.
At the time my son was diagnosed, (and currently) we did not (do not) have prescription coverage. As you can imagine, we get all the free samples we can get.
But this also lead to an issue with wasting insulin. We don’t use the required minimum because of my sons age and diet. So, pulling whatever is left, no matter what the amount is, out of the old pod is now just part of the routine. We do it at every pod change with no adverse effect. We have been doing this routine for about 3 months. In fact, we are generally in range 90% of the time.
We do have one rule though, and that it is we stop the cycle when we start a new bottle. And start a new cycle until the bottle is empty.
Please note, we fully consulted a number of doctors, endos and pod reps who all told us “quietly” that it shouldn’t be a problem reusing the old insulin as long as we broke the cycle somewhere.
Ive done it several times with no ill effects.
me too!
Don’t let it get you down… it does get better. I haven’t had a pod fail on me in a long time.