High sugars that won't come down!

Hi Beth

Have you tried changing your pens/cartridges?

As @robert72 said .

Insulin can "go off " in hot weather, so the first things to do is change the pen or cartridge, and check your insulin pens to see if they are working OK . I remember having ferocious highs a few years back over the Xmas period , and it turned out my Lantus pen was faulty so everything went to bits with no basal insulin ! Trying to get a replacement pen was a nightmare when everywhere was closed, and it taught me to have a back up, and a back up for my back up Now, it's the first thing I check when having unexpected highs, and I always keep my pens in a Frio when out and about too.

You may have some insulin needs changing if the honeymoon period is coming to a close, but this sounds a bit dramatic to be just that .... do you have a diabetic team you could speak to instead of your GP ?
Signy

Some other suspects are:

• Are you taking any new meds (especially steroids)?
• Could all your pens be duds and/or is the fridge cold enough?
• Have you been eating anything very sugary or changed anything in you normal diet?
• Are you stressed?
• Have you been less active than normal?

Also, are you rotating injection sites?

And another... could you have an infection that is not immediately obvious? Bad tooth for example.

I would suggest a change of insulin is in order, ask if you can change over to Apidra & levemir to see if this help resolve your high insulin usage, it's been known that some types of insulins simply don't work in some people, so always worth changing to see if this is the case with you.

Like Noblehead I'd suggest a change of insulin. There are so many possible solutions that I'd get the possible medication problem ruled out first.

Hey, did you find that the change of insulin worked if you changed over? I am on levemir and novo rapid and have the same problem. It will be great for a week or so and then everything will just reverse and I will be in the 20's. Any thing you've tried that worked would help me loads. Thanks

More insulin does not always work either as the evidence is that for BGL above 11 mmol/L corrections work erratically. Try keeping you insulin normal and go for 30 min walks between meals to see if that helps. David


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Thanks for replying! I am a dog walker so I spend most of my day walking which I would expect to bring my sugars down. So do you mean that taking corrective doses of insulin won't always work if your sugars are over 11? Because that's interesting I find that I can inject and inject and nothing will happen for hours and so I take more and still nothing happens until the end of the day where I will have a huge hypo. Does that make sense under what you said or have I got the wrong end of the stick?

CharlotteH said:

Thanks for replying! I am a dog walker so I spend most of my day walking which I would expect to bring my sugars down. So do you mean that taking corrective doses of insulin won't always work if your sugars are over 11? Because that's interesting I find that I can inject and inject and nothing will happen for hours and so I take more and still nothing happens until the end of the day where I will have a huge hypo. Does that make sense under what you said or have I got the wrong end of the stick?

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It's true you will need more correction dose to get high blood sugars down. There should be a formula in sick day rules if you have any. Also wondering if you have trouble with absorption from injection site if you come crashing down later than expected... unless you have been rage-bolusing

Ahh, no I've never had any sick day rules, haha I must say sometimes I can be guilty of that. But only on the occasions where it's so high and it just won't move.
I change my injection sites a lot because I suffered quite badly With a bloated stomach and looked around six months pregnant I assumed it was that the insulin was getting stuck... Self diagnosis so probably nonsense.

Thanks both of you so much for replying. It's making me feel a lot better knowing that People can help and share what's helped them

Hi Beth i have been a t1 for over 50 years but you are never to old to learn new stuff, just a few thoughts, that have come to mind, recently i was having a similar problem but found out my blood pressure tablets were interfering with my sugars i was taking over double my usual amount of insulin this only got worse after the GP tried to increase the B/P meds the 2nd time, another issue i discovered was that the needles i was using were to long they were 8mml now using 4/5ml and have moved the injection site further around the sides of my stomach and this has also made a huge difference. Further over the years i have discovered the 2 main ways i i have to deal with consistent high BGs at first i try to chance them down, this only works for short periods as you then can start a bouncing effect, if this does not settle it i then use my long acting 1 or 2 units higher than normal but no more and then back down my short acting and try to manage a consistent amount each meal and unless i have an infection it does gradually come back, but stress and pain are 2 issues than can hold your bgs up high without realizing it, hope this may help best of luck and try and keep well, Regards Toby.