• Guest, the forum is undergoing some upgrades and so the usual themes will be unavailable for a few days. In the meantime, you can use the forum like normal. We'd love to know what you think about the forum! Take the 2025 Survey »

High blood sugar following cortisone injection

D

dianewilliamson27

Member
I have been using insulin pen regime for 36 years and achieved excellent control and usually know how to manage blips and use correction doses.
However, following a cortisone in my frozen shoulder 72 hours ago blood sugars are still constantly 15-20mml despite increasing correction doses before meals and 4 hourly correction dose of Fiasp overnight. Also increased basal yesterday by 50%. And walking 6 miles a day.
The good news is I am negative for ketones.
Any idea of how long this may last and how quickly the blood sugars may drop. I have never taken so much insulin. Easily more that twice my usual intake.
At least the shoulder pain is less so that's a bonus
 
dianewilliamson27 said:
I have been using insulin pen regime for 36 years and achieved excellent control and usually know how to manage blips and use correction doses.
However, following a cortisone in my frozen shoulder 72 hours ago blood sugars are still constantly 15-20mml despite increasing correction doses before meals and 4 hourly correction dose of Fiasp overnight. Also increased basal yesterday by 50%. And walking 6 miles a day.
The good news is I am negative for ketones.
Any idea of how long this may last and how quickly the blood sugars may drop. I have never taken so much insulin. Easily more that twice my usual intake.
At least the shoulder pain is less so that's a bonus
Click to expand...
Hi dianewilliamson27

I have many doses of steroids both into joints and orally and I have found the raised levels last for about a week. Sometimes a bit longer. It is good that you do not have any ketones. Your Diabetes Team should be able to give some guidance

Hope things begin to improve soon
 
h884 said:
Hi dianewilliamson27

I have many doses of steroids both into joints and orally and I have found the raised levels last for about a week. Sometimes a bit longer. It is good that you do not have any ketones. Your Diabetes Team should be able to give some guidance

Hope things begin to improve soon
Click to expand...
Thanks. In your experience do the raised levels reduce gradually or suddenly.
 
In my experience levels decreased slowly. Steroids really helped me so it was balancing the side effects against the benefits
 
Ok thanks. I don't use a pump so will just carry on with increasing insulin at meals and between if necessary. It still has a long way to fall so probably no need to worry about sudden hypos! As you say the benefits of reduced pain are really helping
 
Thank you so much for this post!

I had a cortisone shot into my shoulder on Monday at 3pm. Overnight that night my levels were uncontrollably high (18 to 20mmol!) and no matter how much insulin I injected they didn't want to come down! I have had Type 1 for 10 years and always had excellent control and near normal Hba1c levels, so it was really scary.

My levels are still stubbornly high but by doubling my Tresiba and tripling my usual rapid insulin doses it has helped get me relatively back to normal.

I can't quite believe how much of an impact a cortisone injection can have. When I'm sick with cold / flu I never really see increased levels, so I kind of thought it might not impact me.

I did know about the possibility of increased blood sugars beforehand but the Consultant I saw shrugged it off and suggested it would only last a day or two and wouldn't be that bad. I'm 3 days in and no sign of it resolving; I really hope they start to come down again soon and that they do so gradually and not as a sudden crash! It worries me that Tresiba lasts so long, as I expect next week I might have a few days of hypos.

Sorry for the long winded post but I just wanted to share my experience in case anyone else in the same position stumbles across this thread ...
 
@pinewood there is an interesting study titled ‘Blood Glucose Levels in Diabetic Patients Following Corticosteroid Injections into the Subacromial Space of the Shoulder’.

Basically, the study concludes that diabetic patients with well controlled blood sugars <7% had an average rise of 38mg/dl after having corticosteroid injections. Their blood sugars returned to normal around day 8. Diabetic patients with Poorly controlled blood sugars remained elevated.

It’s an interesting study . I have provided the link if you are interested.

Blood Glucose Levels in Diabetic Patients Following Corticosteroid Injections into the Subacromial Space of the Shoulder - PMC

Corticosteroid injections are used to treat a variety of orthopedic conditions with the goal of decreasing pain and inflammation. Administration of systemic or local corticosteroids risks temporarily increasing blood glucose levels, especially ...
pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
 
I got a cortisone injection in my shoulder last Friday at 8 am. While my blood sugar seemed OK for the first 12 hours, it went unusually high that night (above 20 mM), so much so, that I found myself injecting corrective doses of insulin every three hours through the night and the next day (my Dexcom7 high alarm kept waking me up).
It was the same the following night; and even though I had doubled my long acting insulin dose before bed, I still had to inject rapid insulin every three hours, trying to bring the blood sugar down - unsuccessfully though!
It's now 3 pm Sunday, and the blood sugar still ranges from 15 mM to above 24 mM, fluctuating due to several corrective doses of rapid acting insulin.
That's what brought me to this website. I'm trying to find out how long it will last.
 
Back
Top