byetta, good or bad?

[paganlass]

hi everyone, ihave a problem. my mum who is type 2 with insulin and has been struggling with her bg,s for years. anyway we have got them to a reasonable level although they do seem to go up and dpwn no matter what we do. she has been offered byetta, now mum was told about this drug ages ago and she seems to think that if she goes on it she wont have to take insulin anymore! now because the doc is useless and so is the consultant we cannot get any advice about this drug. so iam wondering if you know anything about it and can you give me any advice as we are going to the docs tomorrow i would like to be armed with some info.
thanks everyone. p.xx

 

[catherinecherub]

I am sure someone will answer soon Paganlass. Dennis, one of the moderators is an expert on Byetta.

 

[Dennis]

Hi paganlass,

Byetta is not licenced in the UK for use with insulin. Having said that, there are several of our forum members who are prescribed both insulin and Byetta. What generally happens is that you would need the insulin dose reduced because, although Byetta isn't insulin, it encourages the pancreas to produce the right amount of insulin to deal with whatever has been eaten. So with Byetta and insulin, the patient would simply get a double dose of insulin and would most likely have a hypo.

In your mother's case it rather depends on why she takes insulin and how high a dose, and what other diabetes meds she might be taking. If she is on a low dose of insulin simply to top up the amount her pancreas produces, then most likely she would need to come off it, or have the dose reduced. If she is on a high dose, then the question needs to be asked why. If it is because the doctor feels her pancreas is simply unable to produce sufficient insulin of its own, then Byetta wouldn't be much use to her. It would be like putting petrol into an engine that doesn't work any more! Alternatively if her pancreas is able to produce insulin, then why has she been prescribed it?

I think your best approach with the doctor might be to ask for a C-peptide test for your mother. This is a test that shows exactly how much insulin her pancreas produces, so would show whether or not Byetta would be beneficial for her. Without that test then any decision is simply based on a guess.

Hope that helps, but fire away if you have any more questions.

 

[Janesi]

I was put onto Byetta back in November and was also still taking insulin, albeit reduced by half. Unfortunately I had a severe reaction to the byetta and stopped taking it.

It seems a very good drug, but nfortunately the side effect is nausea. I persevered for 1 month and felt really rubbish for most of that time. I tried injecting at different times before the meal, but nothing made any difference to the nausea. In the end the diabetic nurse and I came to the same conclusion, that I had given it a good go, but it was no way to live my life.

Since then I have had some difficulty in regulating my sugars and getting back to where I was, but I will get back there again.

Good Luck to your Mum - hope she has better luck than me.

 

[paganlass]

hi dennis ans jansei thanks for replying. dennis mum is on 46 units of insulin spread out through the day ( nuvorapid ) and 34 units of lantus at night she also takes 2 metformin, one with breakfast and one with her tea. i dont know why they put her on insulin 2and a half years ago ,all i can get out of her doc is that her bg level was 9.7 so they put her on insulin. i personally think she could have managed on diet alone, which she had been on since 1995 but she was always told to have a high carb diet which we now know caused all her problems. weight gain and bg levels in the 27 and higher. they are now down to single figures usually around 7 to 9 and although still high it is good for her. she has started getting bg levels of 5.9 and 6.7 but she panics a bit because she is used to the high level.do you think it would be worth putting her on byetta, she seems to have pinned her hopes on it.
jansei im sorry that the byetta didnt work for you, the doc has told mum that it may make her sick for a while but like you she would not be able to cope if she sick for that long. i hope you feel better soon and your bg levels out soon. xx
p.xx

 

[Dennis]

Hi paganlass,

It does seem that your mother could have managed perfectly well on a combination of oral meds plus the correct diet. If she really wants to try Byetta and there are no medical reasons why she shouldn't, then why not. But, as was the case with Janesi, she will certainly need to have the insulin reduced, probably by half initially. She will also need to check her BS levels through the day, because it could be difficult to find the right balance between insulin and Byetta, and may eventually mean coming off insulin altogether once she is on the full dose of Byetta (patients are always started on 5μg for at least a month before being upped to the 10μg dose). The Byetta is dispensed via a pen that delivers a fixed dose, whereas the amount of insulin can be varied.

 

[Trinkwasser]

I was put onto Byetta back in November and was also still taking insulin, albeit reduced by half. Unfortunately I had a severe reaction to the byetta and stopped taking it.

It seems a very good drug, but nfortunately the side effect is nausea. I persevered for 1 month and felt really rubbish for most of that time. I tried injecting at different times before the meal, but nothing made any difference to the nausea. In the end the diabetic nurse and I came to the same conclusion, that I had given it a good go, but it was no way to live my life.

Since then I have had some difficulty in regulating my sugars and getting back to where I was, but I will get back there again.

Good Luck to your Mum - hope she has better luck than me.

From what I've seen in US groups (where it's been in use for a lot longer) it works very well for some people and not at all or poorly for others. It is used in combination with insulin there, mostly under the control of an Endo because the doses need to be carefully balanced, and it's important to test a lot.

I could be wrong but I think Steven Edelman

http://www.tcoyd.org/homepage.php

has some stuff about it