Insulin Intake System

Welcome to the forum Mary,I'm not type 1 so can't answer your question fully but I think you will find that it is much more complicated than that.There are various other things that have to be taken into consideration apart from blood sugar levels such as carb intake,exercise etc. I hope that a member who is type one can come and answer your question more fully.

My son is Type 1 (aged 2) and had diabetes since he was 8 months old. It is a constant balancing act between carbohydrate, insulin, activity, stress and growth to keep him with reasonable blood glucose levels. His long acting insulin (Levemir) does have the effect of peaking greater amounts of insulin at different times of the day. Hopefully this coincides with his meals where he will also get a bolus of fast acting insulin (Novorapid). Your system sounds interesting but I think the risk of a severe hypo would be high. I have often thought that an implant would be a great idea as a long acting insulin but you would need to be able to have some sort of control in case of illness. For some strange reason bodies just don't run at a steady pace all the time, no matter how you control your diet. I hope many people keep thinking of ways to improve the management of diabetes just in case a cure is further off than we envisage. I hope you send in a summary of your dissertation for us to read.
Jen

Mary, If you are really meaning that your system will give a dose of insulin just based on a particular bood sugar reading then I don't think this would work. Perhaps you haven't told us some other parameters you are also considering.
Usually when you have an injection there are a number of factors you have to take into account like
What is your current Blood Sugar, What you are going to eat ,What you have just been doing,What you are going to be doing
The DAFNE system in my view has these things well covered so I suggest that if you can get hold of any of the DAFNE literature that might help you. They have a web site.
If you have any more questions I would be happy to help, I am a scientist and have lots of experience of the pharmaceutical industry. Would love to read your dissertation when it is finished.
Good luck and don't hesitate to ask for a view on any further thoughts you have.
Cheers
JER

Hi mary_4


firstly welcome to the forum..

As already been mentioned that apart from the good old carb and the blood sugar measurement, there are other factors such as stress, even the ambient tempreture can have a effect...

I think if you have a look at some of the newer isnulin pumps that combine a continuous glucose monitor (CGM) and the different wizards for bolusing and correction this would be very helpful for you...

A good question to ask a diabetic, is what they would like or feel they need within a system?

I do use a insulin pump sadly mine doesn't have the ability of CGM or some of the wizards.

But if asked the question of wants and needs I would answer as follows

A system, that can monitor my BG's 24/7,
A system tha contains a computer that learns, by this I mean that over a period of times it learns how ambient tempretures effect my levels, how exercise effects my levels etc.
It does contain some form of glucose delivery, This would enable it to act more like a pancreas, if levels start to drop it can then supply a determined amount of glucose to stablise the your levels..

This system could be as my pump is, connected via cannular, or in fact a implantation of a system?

Hope this has given some food for thought...

Don't forget ask questions as you need, as you will find that we will give as much information as possible...

I also like the idea of a control system that 'learns' , it needs to be able to react instantaneously to changes in exercise levels, release of stress hormones etc. A true artificial pancreas.
I think theres a long way to go for that but an implanted closed loop system is being developed.
This paper gives some info on the first clinical trials with it.
http://www.scielo.br/pdf/abem/v52n2/23.pdf

Others and myself have produced an "insulin calculator".

This is free and downloadable in pc and palm versions. You can see how it works and download it at www.dsolve.com The instructions are in the type one module regarding carb/insulin reduction and matching.

The calculator gives a very good estimate for rapid insulin regarding refined carbs and corrections. You then need to factor in protein and the "pizza effect" to decide on the amount of regular and any adjustment between the types. It is an art form getting the insulin right !