Pump basal setting for long period at night

[jimmax]

For several months now I've had to adjust my basal settings with zero insulin for several hours while sleeping. here are my basal settings now.

12am 0.0u, 3am 0.75u, 10am 1.4u, 2.30pm 1.75u, 5pm 0.5u, 6pm 5.0u, 7pm. 2.0u, 8pm. 0.0u.

I'm keen to know if anyone else has zero settings like this. My DSN does not help me with information about this situation and my management is all done by myself using Libre/Miaomiao/xDrip. I assume I have a big dump of glucose from my liver at 6pm causing a complete lack of glucose from the liver for 7hrs from 8pm. I also appear now to be producing a small amount of my own Insulin. I'm 81 yr old and maturity onset T1. BG is slowly getting harder to control. M last hba1c was 6.6. Any thoughts on this would be greatly appreciated.

 

[jimmax]

My DSN said all people with T1 are different. For example, my highest basal is between 1:30pm and 4:30pm and my basal during the night is quite a bit lower (but not zero).
Other people’s basal patterns are not important. Your basal pattern is what matters for you. If a zero basal in the early hours works for you, stick with it.

My only thought is whether you have a drink in the evening. Our livers can only do be thing at a time - release glucose or deal with alcohol. As long as we know this and can manage our diabetes, my opinion is drinking is not a problem.

This may not be the reason and I mean nothing by suggesting it so I hope you don’t take offence.

 

[jimmax]

Thanks Response for your reply. I sometimes have a wine before evening food. I'll keep an eye on it.

 

[Chas C]

Your basal range looks very large from 0 units to 5 units across 24 hours, mine varies but no more than 1 unit and block to block around 0.2 units. Are you sure you have set your basals correctly ? i.e. fasted with flat glucose levels to set them. Looks to me more like your overloading early mid evening then having to reduce to zero. But I'm not an expert on your diabetes, only mine.

 

[jimmax]

Thanks for your input Chas C. Like you, I think it must be very unusual to need such a large insulin dose and then zero insulin for several hours. It seems to me the main problem must have something to do with the liver. This started about a year ago with a 2hr zero segment needed from 11pm to 1am and has progressed to the big glucose dump and extended zero time. I'm still managing to keep control but I'd be ******** without the monitor. I would really like to have someone respond who has the same thing happening to them but I think the chances are slim. Have you ever needed a zero insulin segment? That alone seems very odd to me. Thank you very much for your response.

 

[Chas C]

I would really like to have someone respond who has the same thing happening to them but I think the chances are slim. Have you ever needed a zero insulin segment? That alone seems very odd to me. Thank you very much for your response.

Hi Jim - sadly no I've never gone down to zero deliberately (although my pump does do it if I'm going low). Once I was kayaking for 5 days on white water in Nepal (on a multi day trip - non stop) and managed a day and a half with no insulin (never had that before - pre pump). One other thing your basal timings look really long to me. I had hourly settings before I moved to the t:slim where I was forced to move as its limited to 12 (so every two hours) but you only have 8 (so average every 3 hrs) - which would not work for me.