• Guest - w'd love to know what you think about the forum! Take the 2025 Survey »

Need Help For Hubbie

N

Nilla

Member
Messages
23
My husband started being ill last Friday he was shivering but was red hot and very sleepy, took him to the GP and they said his chest was a bit crackly so gave him antibiotics.
He is Type 2 diabetic and has been for 4 years, he is on metformin 4 tablets a day and Glicazide 4 tablets a day, over the weekend his sugar were in the high 20's, on Monday he went back to the GP at 2pm and was asked to go back at 4pm and his sugars were 29 so they said they wanted to see him Tues at 8am that morning he felt really ill he could hardly walk and had ketones in his urine so they admitted him to hospital, a chest x ray showed his chest had cleared up, the hospital only checked his sugars twice a day and they were high and there was talk of putting him on insulin, anyway Thursday teatime the doctor said he could go home and just to carry on as normal. Its now Saturday and his sugars are 18.2 first thing in a morning rising to 25 through the day, his diet is good but he has lost 10lbs since Tuesday and is so weak he can hardly stand up, he feels weak, shaky and dizzy.

he says he would rather go on insulin than feel like he does, has anyone got any advice for me please its horrible to see him so bad
 
Hello Nilla

If yr husband is as bad as you say, then the best thing to do is call 999 and say that hubby has very high bg levels and is on verge of possibly going into DKA. If he is well enough you could drive him straight to A&E and demand that he be seen by someone with diabetes expertise but I think an ambulance is the best way to go. I would think that they should admit him especially as he is losing weight due to high bg levels.

I think from what you have said; insulin, Byetta or Victoza would be the best thing for him if he doesn't mind injecting. It will make him feel one hell of a lot better.

Although you say he is eating healthily but what exactly is he eating? All diabetics do need to look at the carbohydrate content on food and eat accordingly to what effect medication has on blood glucose levels. For type 2's they need to restrict carb and eat in smaller quantities and then sugar levels should come down.
 
Well for breakfast he had a slice of brown toast with low fat spread, he hardly eats any bread or potatoes, for tea last night he had steamed cod with broccoli, peas and carrots. he never eats sweet things or pasta
I have just rung NHS Direct and they are ringing me back, do you know if you can buy those ketone testing strips from a chemist or do you need a prescription for them, we have never had any and I want to check his ketones
 
Hi

Yes they are called Ketostix and cost about £5 I think. You just run them through a stream of urine.

He obviously isn't eating that much so I do think that you should get him into hospital asap really before he gets much worse. I gp would only be able to tell him to take more tabs and it seems as though he is taking more than enough of those with no effect. A gp surgery dsn will know more about insulin so that is only if you can get to see one fairly quickly but as its a weekend, then hospital is best place.
 
Thanks, we have a drop in centre and have been told to take him there in an hour by NHS dirct, when he was in hospital they didnt seem to care at all
 
It's probably because hubby was just seen by a dr who doesn't know too much but once he is seen by a D consultant or even a DSN then med can be altered. Ketostix run through urine will show whether its there but what you've got to remember is that the keytone level in blood will be much higher which isn't good. Does his breath smell of peardrops or is there an unsavoury smell coming from his body odour?
 
Extract from website:
DKA is most common in patients with type 1 diabetes mellitus (DM) and develops when insulin levels are insufficient to meet the body's basic metabolic requirements. DKA is the first manifestation of type 1 DM in a minority of patients. Insulin deficiency can be absolute (eg, during lapses in the administration of exogenous insulin) or relative (eg, when usual insulin doses do not meet metabolic needs during physiologic stress). Common physiologic stresses that can trigger DKA include acute infection (particularly pneumonia and UTI), MI , stroke, pancreatitis, and trauma. Drugs implicated in causing DKA include corticosteroids, thiazide diuretics, and sympathomimetics. DKA is less common in type 2 DM, but it may occur in situations of unusual physiologic stress
Click to expand...

Full article from Merck website:
http://www.merck.com/mmpe/sec12/ch158/ch158c.html

get him to hospital, insulin will be the quickest way to bring his bg's down. the way he is feeling he wont want to eat and byetta and victoza would be useless in these circumstances.
dont mean to be nasty but you only have one husband , do what you have to do at the hospital , scream shout or swear (or do them all)

the doctors there are just like your gp, a bit like a back street garage, if you want a porsche servicing would you take it to erics autos round the corner? no you take it to porsche! (in fact you get them to pick it up) treat your hubby like you would a porsche. they have consultants on call at hospitals get him off his backside and make him earn his money.

:evil: :evil: :evil: :evil:
 
Well we went to the drop in centre, they tested for Ketones and that was clear, took his temp which was normal, BP normal looked at his blood sugars for yesterday and today and just said go see your GP on Monday morning!
 
Nilla said:
Well for breakfast he had a slice of brown toast with low fat spread, he hardly eats any bread or potatoes, for tea last night he had steamed cod with broccoli, peas and carrots. he never eats sweet things or pasta
I have just rung NHS Direct and they are ringing me back, do you know if you can buy those ketone testing strips from a chemist or do you need a prescription for them, we have never had any and I want to check his ketones
Click to expand...

Hi

I'm sorry that drop in centre weren't very helpful but at least hubby didn't have ketones and bp was ok. Unfortunately folk at drop in centre are not experts in D so not surprised really that they ignored the high bg readings and told you to go to gp on Monday. If he gets much worse (sickness, confused, red in the face etc ) then just go straight to hospital by car, taxi or ambulance.

In the meantime, start to really cut back on the amount of carb he is eating. Breakfast time omit the toast and just use some fried bacon, egg and tomatoe. This will help a bit in keeping his bg level lower. Lunchtime just eat one small potatoe and some meat plus loads of green type veg. The same for eve meal. Don't drink any alcohol just use black coffee and plenty of mineral or plain water. Hopefully this will see him okish until Monday.
 
Back
Top