Puzzled about TV shows dealing with diabetes

[Pat5496]

I'm puzzled about the way information is presented on TV programs regarding the use of insulin.
I've just seen yet another program where a person was slipping into a diabetic coma, and everybody rushed around to find her insulin pen, gave her a jab, and saved the day.
Now, unless I've completely misunderstood the whole blood sugar/insulin thing, the LAST thing she needs is insulin. What she needs is glucose. The coma is caused by the person's blood sugar being too LOW, and the addition of insulin will make it go LOWER, right?
On this occasion it was a police drama, but I've seen the same thing happening on medical dramas where they must surely have an expert medical advisor on hand.
Confused
Pat

 

[EllieM]

On this occasion it was a police drama, but I've seen the same thing happening on medical dramas where they must surely have an expert medical advisor on hand.

Oh but a desperately searched for injection is much better visual drama than a common or garden glucose tablet, or jellybean or whatever carbs are handily available pretty well anywhere you go.

T1 diabetics can go into comas through lack of insulin, but that is diabetic ketoacidosis, and by the time it's sent you into a coma you need a trip to A&E and some time having your blood flushed out in intensive care rather than just a solitary injection... (I think, ready to be corrected by a T1 who's had more experience of this than me, which is anyone who's had any DKAs).

The case that really annoyed me was the insulin dependent diabetic in that dreadful film Con Air...

 

[Pat5496]

Yes, better telly, but dangerously misleading!
I recently asked my sister - who is a trained First Responder - what she would do if she thought I was slipping into a diabetic coma. Her answer: "Call an ambo, because we are not allowed to administer injections."

 

[Deleted member 308541]

Doc Martin is pretty free with a bottle of insulin as well, shares a thermometer amongst several people without wiping it on something, same as as sharing a Ventolin inhaler with out wiping the inhaler afterwards.

 

[kev-w]

I find shouting at the tv when they mis portray T1d makes you feel better, a few expletives and a shake of the finger does the trick

 

[Brunneria]

While I suspect that you are right, and it simply comes down to bad research on the part of the TV script writers, there is actually a condition charmingly known as HONK that T2s can develop
https://www.diabetes.co.uk/diabetes-complications/hyperglycaemic-hyperosmolar-nonketotic-coma.html
which can cause a coma, doesn’t involve ketones, and needs insulin when blood glucose levels are too high.

The sister in law of an ex-colleague of mine developed this when on a cruise. She was airlifted off the cruise liner and spent 3 days in a hospital, in a coma, before it occurred to anyone that it could be HONK. Bizarre. She was a known T2, and had been eating cruise food, yet no one worked it out... a story almost worthy of a bad TV drama

 

[Jaylee]

I'm puzzled about the way information is presented on TV programs regarding the use of insulin.
I've just seen yet another program where a person was slipping into a diabetic coma, and everybody rushed around to find her insulin pen, gave her a jab, and saved the day.
Now, unless I've completely misunderstood the whole blood sugar/insulin thing, the LAST thing she needs is insulin. What she needs is glucose. The coma is caused by the person's blood sugar being too LOW, and the addition of insulin will make it go LOWER, right?
On this occasion it was a police drama, but I've seen the same thing happening on medical dramas where they must surely have an expert medical advisor on hand.
Confused
Pat

Lol, the only thing I've seen as closly factual regarding an insulin dependant diabetic, is the 80s film "Warlock." But that didn't involve insulin.. She did sort of save "the day" with a syringe though..

 

[DavidGrahamJones]

Thy needed one of these.

 

[Member496333]

I suppose, giving the benefit of the doubt, one could think of it as a glucagon jab, and an audience who've never even heard of glucagon

 

[Robinredbreast]

On this occasion it was a police drama, but I've seen the same thing happening on medical dramas where they must surely have an expert medical advisor on hand.
Confused

Hi @Pat5496 clearly not, it's probably someone on the production team who has a friend who's next door neighbour knows someone else who 'knows what to do'. A possible death sentence

 

[Robinredbreast]

If I need to tell someone close about type 1 highs and lows, I say hypo, means low, I need to eat. Hyper is high, but I can still fly and never to inject me with Insulin.

 

[Robinredbreast]

Oh but a desperately searched for injection is much better visual drama than a common or garden glucose tablet, or jellybean or whatever carbs are handily available pretty well anywhere you go.

T1 diabetics can go into comas through lack of insulin, but that is diabetic ketoacidosis, and by the time it's sent you into a coma you need a trip to A&E and some time having your blood flushed out in intensive care rather than just a solitary injection... (I think, ready to be corrected by a T1 who's had more experience of this than me, which is anyone who's had any DKAs).

The case that really annoyed me was the insulin dependent diabetic in that dreadful film Con Air...

Never heard of the film Con Air

 

[JohnEGreen]

When I was a teenager we had a close family friend who was T1 all her family and friends carried sugar cubes or similar about their person in case as was often the case she had a sudden low sugar attack and passed out.

So I just got used to having a pocket full of sugar cubes just in case though had to be a little wary of Dartmoor Ponies when out on the moor.

 

[NicoleC1971]

Type ones are much better in TV dramas. We can be kidnapped and die quickly without our meds or suddenly faint with a hypo. Very boring to just eat a jelly baby and get on with your day.
The only exception I can think of is John Thaw's Morse who dies of type 2 complications in hospital; his creator Colin Dexter was a type 2

 

[ROE100]

Yes i also get to shout at the telly re a drama error, mostly they are lost on their own without they insulin so will be going into a coma - more likley to feel unwell without their long acting keeping them level.

But the worst one I saw was medical actual programme where an elderly lady woudn't open the door for the nurse and carers so the nurse called the 999 to ask for assistance. She advise the ambulance crew she is diabectic and hypo! - didn't advise which type but said she been like this before 'agressive' but she had brought her insulin and come to do her injection for her meal as she hadn't had anytthing since yesterday evening so must be hypo. Maybe I missed something but if the lady doesn't do her own injections then why would she be hypo - note there was lots of high carb foods in the house so more lilley would have still eaten food. The Ambulance crew finally got entry and her levels were fine.

Roe

 

[Bittern]

Never heard of the film Con Air

You haven't missed much.

 

[Jaylee]

Type ones are much better in TV dramas. We can be kidnapped and die quickly without our meds or suddenly faint with a hypo. Very boring to just eat a jelly baby and get on with your day.
The only exception I can think of is John Thaw's Morse who dies of type 2 complications in hospital; his creator Colin Dexter was a type 2

There was the rather creative one in the 1995 film Species where a T1 was "picked up" in a nightclub by an escaped labortitory alien hybrid, then murdered brutally when he didn't stack up genetically to her idea of an ideal "mate."

 

[NicoleC1971]

There was the rather creative one in the 1995 film Species where a T1 was "picked up" in a nightclub by an escaped labortitory alien hybrid, then murdered brutally when he didn't stack up genetically to her idea of an ideal "mate."

Love that we are shunned even by aliens and others who have pancreatic priviledge

 

[Jaylee]

Love that we are shunned even by aliens and others who have pancreatic priviledge

I feel our pancreas has the "privilege." They don't exactly earn their keep..

 

[Deleted member 308541]

On Netflix is a television series called "Colony", diabetics get a bad deal in this as the invaders do not class them as worthy people"

Some medical problems, such as diabetes, have been "deemed unworthy for treatment" by the Hosts, to cull the population

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colony_(TV_series)