I’m currently on MDI and have been for 40 years. I would like to switch to Omnipod. I know Omnipod is only good for three days or 200 units, whichever comes first.
I’m on a split dose of Lantus and then Humalog on a sliding scale to cover meals and snacks. I take a total of 90 units a day in insulin between the two. It sounds to me like an Omnipod will only be good for me for two days.
Am I understanding this correctly? I’m wondering if it’s worth it since I require so much insulin every day. I make absolutely non on my own.
I have a 2 day OmniPod prescription. 2 day prescriptions instead of 3 day prescriptions are quite common. Try it out. If you don’t like it, switch back to MDI.
That amount of insulin might exhaust/stress the infusion site. Then again, you might find you use a little less insulin on a pump than you do on MDI (a correction before a high is more effective than after.)
I’m with Helmut, give it a try. If the amount of insulin becomes an issue, you could still inject maybe a half or third dose of your current basal insulin or you could take a Type II drug to lower your insulin needs. I don’t personally do either of those things, so take those suggestions with a grain of salt, but might be worth bringing up with your doctor.
When I first switched to a pump my endo changed me to Humalog 200 so I wouldn’t have to switch it out every 2 days. But when I switched to a pump my use of insulin fell from about 80 units a day to around 50 units. Just being able to control basal rate better, better dosing in small amounts for corrections, easier to predose and then dose when eating etc made a huge difference for me.
So I could have switched back but I got used to and liked the 200 anyways and the fact I would never have to worry about how much I had in it. But I generally fill the minimum amount now which is 80, but really 160 and never have to worry. The trick is in the programming for the Humalog 200 though, some things are doubled, some halved.
My script is written for every 2 day change out nowadays, because I am prone to site issues and have to change them out early some of the time.
