long distance travel ( 8 hour time change )

himtoo

Well-Known Member
Retired Moderator
Messages
4,805
Type of diabetes
Type 1
Treatment type
Pump
Dislikes
mean people , gardening , dishonest people , and war.
why can't everyone get on........
Hi All
I will be travelling to the west coast of the USA in about 5 weeks time.

my main concern is the time change regarding basal settings on my pump . and the swing between daytime rates and the rise I have on a normal basal setting between 9pm and 4am ( 0.7u hour hour at 9pm rising to 2.05u per hour at 4am )
I do have a pretty decent DP -- LOL

here are flight times to put some meat on the bones

Manchester to Amsterdam 5:55am depart land 8:15am ( pump time 7:15am )
Amsterdam to Portland , Oregon depart 9:55am land 11:25am ( pump time 7:25pm )

really just looking for any advice on how others have handled this sort of a time change.

edit to add -- first long distance travel since starting pumping 16 months ago .
 
Last edited:

MaxRebo001

Well-Known Member
Messages
73
Type of diabetes
Type 2
Sorry i'm not type 1 but i did used to have fairly hefty DP anywhere from 13-19 in the morning.

Long haul flights were actually pretty good for my levels, primarily due to fact meal sizes were reduced, humping suitcases about and back then i could never sleep on a plane so i was pretty stable......until i got to the USA.

Discovered my love of root beer and dennys etc, i pretty much had no DP then, but my levels never got out of the teens.

It seemed like a good idea at the time.
 

noblehead

Guru
Retired Moderator
Messages
23,618
Type of diabetes
Type 1
Treatment type
Pump
Dislikes
Disrespectful people
I've not travelled abroad since starting on a pump so can't offer any advice Paul, but in the absence of any replies why don't you ask your pump DSN what you should do.
 

azure

Expert
Messages
9,780
Type of diabetes
Type 1
Treatment type
Pump
@himtoo When I flew to Canada, I adjusted my pump clock in two stages, 4 hours at a time (for an 8hr time difference). I don't remember exactly when I did this, but I think the first change was on the plane and the second just before landing/just after landing. So I'd split the time and adjust to local time where you're going in two stages :)

I found that worked well.
 

Chas C

Well-Known Member
Messages
1,045
Type of diabetes
Type 1
Treatment type
Pump
@himtoo When I flew to Canada, I adjusted my pump clock in two stages, 4 hours at a time (for an 8hr time difference). I don't remember exactly when I did this, but I think the first change was on the plane and the second just before landing/just after landing. So I'd split the time and adjust to local time where you're going in two stages :)

I found that worked well.
.

I travel a lot on long haul flights where journey is 14+ hours and time difference is 8 hours, I do the same change the timing 50% on leaving and 50% on landing.

Try http://www.diabetestravel.org/
 

hboyt

Well-Known Member
Messages
98
Type of diabetes
Type 1
I just went to Los Angeles for Christmas which is the same 8 hour difference and my dsn recommended switching the time when i landed and it worked fine. :)
But my rate is 12am 1.5 to 3am 1.7 which isnt as big of a increase as you have
 

Stefano

Well-Known Member
Messages
123
Type of diabetes
Type 1
Treatment type
Pump
Hi Himtoo, I always changed my time after I arrived at destination, in California, in Australia and Mexico and it always worked. After all my opinion is that what counts is when your brain perceives it is a different time. And this does not happen instantly.