Quick please help!

[Blondie153]

Just gave my daughter 11u of Levemir (her new morning dose in morning) at night time. She gets about 18 u of novorapid so her level of basal has been about 20.5u today so just over 50% of her bolus. She normally gets 5 at night so tonight I more than doubled it be accident. What do I do? Her blood sugar is 6 this evening and she has been swimming, please advise
M

 

[SamJB]

I don't quite understand, have you doubled her Novorapid by mistake? She will need some extra carbs immediately, double what she normally had. Failing that, get some lucozade or a sugary drink in her.

Has she had the correct amount of levimir?

 

[imalittlefishy]

Please don't panic, this is the kind of mistake that happens to everyone at least once! I've done it before and I'm afraid it was just a case of even more frequent checking than usual and having a ready supply of short and long acting carbs on hand if needed. You may need to wake your daughter up during the night to get her to eat something to keep her levels up, but by morning things should be starting to settle back to normal. Good luck!
xx

 

[imalittlefishy]

Sam JB, I think Blondie has doubled the levemir by mistake but the novorapid for the day has been as normal...?
xx

 

[Blondie153]

Yes I doubled her Levemir by mistake. She had her novorapid at the usual time. Do I test her throughout the night? What sort of things should I feed her bearing in mind that she will just be wakened and is only 8. What dose of Levemir do I give her in the morning. She is supposed to get 11 do I give her half of this? Thanks for all your help panicking a bit. She had Levemir at 7:45 so was going to test her again at 10:30 what do you think?
Mx

 

[imalittlefishy]

I would say yes, test her throughout the night. Maybe a little more frequently, say hourly for the next two hours to see how much it is affecting her, and then you can stretch it to every few hours. As far as food is concerned, if she's actually hypo when you test, the most important thing is just getting the carbs in her, so whatever she will eat most happily! If that's a teaspoon of honey followed by a biscuit or two then that's fine, just something sugary and then something starchy. If her blood sugar is dropping but not yet under 4, you don't need to worry too much about the fast acting carbs. Just keep a close eye and adjust as needed, and it's probably better to be running a bit high just for tonight! For levemir in the morning, I would reduce it depending on how low she has been dropping overnight/how often you've had to wake her to eat. It may be that you don't need to half it, perhaps reduce it to 7 or 8 units. Again, keep an eye on her sugars in the morning but it should start to settle down as tonight's levemir runs out.
xx

 

[Blondie153]

Imalittlefishy, thank you so much for your help I was really anxious that I put her in danger. Just shows you that you can get distracted, and to be more careful. I really appreciate your help, thanks again
Mx

 

[l0vaduck]

Yes I doubled her Levemir by mistake. She had her novorapid at the usual time. Do I test her throughout the night? What sort of things should I feed her bearing in mind that she will just be wakened and is only 8. What dose of Levemir do I give her in the morning. She is supposed to get 11 do I give her half of this? Thanks for all your help panicking a bit. She had Levemir at 7:45 so was going to test her again at 10:30 what do you think?
Mx

If it was me, I think I would eat something before going to sleep that would keep me going - something slow acting. Fortunately when I go to sleep I find that my digestion slows down anyway so a big meal before bed often raises my levels for several hours longer than it normally would. I think I'd go for something containing fat and protein and not just carbs - maybe cheese on toast!

As others have said I'd also be waking up to test myself every few hours. Do you know when the Levermir normally peaks?

By morning a lot of the extra dose should have worn off so I probably wouldn't halve the am dose.

Don't you have a diabetes helpline at your hospital? They would be able to give you advice. We can only say what we would do!

 

[imalittlefishy]

No worries, I remember how scary it was when I did this when I was about 12! Try not to beat yourself up about it, it's so easy to get distracted. Hope you both have an ok night despite the extra testing xx

 

[Blondie153]

Thanks again, unfortunately when we have had to get in touch with them in the past they take forever (hrs ) to get back to you in which case the situation has changed and also our consultant told us not to bother as they wouldn't be any use anyway so no confidence there then. So we are just trying to do our best in a tricky situation. Just wakened her to test her and her bg has gone up to 10.6 so at least she is not low. Thanks everyone we are only 7 mths into this craic and still finding our feet if I don't kill her in the meantime.
Mx