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Remember when ?

Anaelena

Well-Known Member
Messages
196
Location
Texas , USA
Type of diabetes
Type 1
Treatment type
Pump
Does anyone else remember when we did not have urine dip sticks and had some sort of mad scientist lab kit to test our urine . It contained a Doppler , small tablets and a card ? We would basically have to use to Doppler to grab urine , place the urine on the tablets and wait for the tablets to turn a color to determine what the results were . We have come a long way lol. I was pretty lazy and would usually just fake it and write down negative. I also remember the first insulin pumps much like cell phones ( thankfully ) they have gotten smaller, as I remember the ones that were huge . What else has come a long way ?
 
Yes the Clinitest Kit, happy memories................not
 
How long have you had diabetes, I remember having to pee on a stick, looking for the correct colour, I remember the plastic syringes and welcomed the pen with open arms. The testing meter's have got a lot smaller, some were like house bricks. I have two, and the Aviva nano is dinky and fits just great into a handbag.
Reading about diabetic children being placed into homes to be looked after and cared for, there was a thread about it a while back and it really touched me, happy memories for many of them, but thankfully so different today.
 
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It is strange because I seem to get stuck on dates ... for about 5 years I was diabetic for 20 years and then I was diabetic for 30 years for another 5 )) lol.. This month is my 37th year anniversary. I was not stuck on 36th . I am ready move forward .

The glucose machines really were huge. Lol there was no subtle way to test with those things as the strips were also long as well . Lol
 
Lol i remember it well
. Only posted on another thread about this earlier. Was diagnosed in early 1975 so had to use the clinitest stuff. The night before my childhood hosp appointments my mom would hand me the coloured pencils and i would have to make up weeks worth of little coloured squares for log book results. As i said earlier, i don't know how i survived the early days lol.
 
I also remember the first finger pricker........the autolet "slasher"!! Ha ha it was the skinhead of the finger pricking world
 
I remember the Ames Clinitest kit with test tube one end, tablets in the middle and doppler the other end. Wee in a jug over the loo, draw up 5 drops of urine and put in test tube, then 5 drops of water and add to test tube. Put a Clinitest tab in the tube and watch the urine and water fizz up and change colour. Mine was usually blue in the morning, pale green before eve meal and orange 2% sometimes before bed. Loved it when I could use Clinistix and just pass them through a stream of urine when using the loo.

I also remember the Gillette 5/8" disposable needles that replaced the stainless steel needle for the glass Rocket Rand insulin syringe.
 

Is a Doppler like a pipette where you are? Doppler means something different to me, here.
 
Only to well,a drop of urine on tablet and it changed colour to measure Ketones and 5drops of urine and 10 drops water in a test tube,plus a tablet and it changed colour between blue 0% and orange 2% glucose in your urine.How did we manage?Diagnosed in 1964.
 
Ahh the Clinitest in its little grey plastic holder with test tube, pipette and bottle of tablets. I used to think I was some kind of professor boffin with the pipette and the way the test tube got hot with the reagent tablet. The results meant frankly nothing to me, orange meant my blood sugar had been high sometime in the previous 5+ hours and blue could mean I was hypo or anything in between.

I used to use different colour felt tip pens to write the results in my log book so it looked as if I hadn't filled them in the night before clinic. I remember one doctor asking me if the different colours meant anything in terms of results and I said it depended which room I was in and which pen was to hand when I wrote the result down. He must have seen right through me! The ability to fudge the results was infinite. I used tap water instead of urine to get a negative result if my Mum ever challenged me about my control.

Thank goodness for technology
 
If you added more water you got a better result
 
Ladybirdy75 said:
I also remember the first finger pricker........the autolet "slasher"!! Ha ha it was the skinhead of the finger pricking world
Click to expand...

I seriously wish I would of kept my first ones. They would look like old torture devices to people now . Lol
 
AndBreathe said:
Is a Doppler like a pipette where you are? Doppler means something different to me, here.
Click to expand...

No you are correct .. I meant to say dropper !!! These letters get in the way of my thoughts sometimes ! Haha

Now that that I think about I may have been calling it a Doppler all these years . Lol
 
Anaelena said:
I seriously wish I would of kept my first ones. They would look like old torture devices to people now . Lol
Click to expand...

I've still got my Autolet in a drawer somewhere. It was like a mini guillotine with the lancet whipping around - all in view unlike the enclosed devices now.

On the advice of my diabetes clinic I remember spending ages cutting my BM sticks in half to get twice the amount (these were the originals as made by Boehringer Mannheim).
 

I remember cutting them in half too !!! I forgot about that and yes the autolet was exactly the one I was talking about ! We were not light weights . Lol
 


So glad you did Ladybirdy, I enjoy your posts immensely 40 years then for you, wow that's fantastic
 
Ladybirdy75 said:
I also remember the first finger pricker........the autolet "slasher"!! Ha ha it was the skinhead of the finger pricking world
Click to expand...





Still brings back bad memories, who on earth though of making that device
 
Oh those were the days.

Remember how you would burn your self if you touched the bottom of the test tube whilst the tablet started to bubble away !

And how all the tablets would stick together and melt in to each other if they got damp !

Having to boil your metal and glass syringe in water to sterilise it before injecting. I loved mine so much I used to take it apart and clean it like a soldier cleans his weapon ! (rifle I mean by that !)

And the metal needles that were like javelins !

The light blue syringe holder that you had to put white spirit at the bottom to keep the needle clean. Used to keep mine at the back of a kitchen unit where we kept the potatoes !

How hypo's were called insulin reactions.

How many more can we add ?
 
Anaelena said:
I seriously wish I would of kept my first ones. They would look like old torture devices to people now . Lol
Click to expand...

They so would
. I always felt traumatised after using mine, resorted to stabbing myself with those little steel lancets. Oh the horror lol
 
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