Hallo, I would really like to connect with anyone who has both these conditions like me. I am partially sighted and would like to know how you manage doing injections and blood tests, what equipment you use for it etc. Diabetes UK has no groups or advice for this and I feel quite isolated so any info or experiences would be so helpful thank you!
Hello @DiabeticDi I know that my DSN has a number of partially sighted insulin dependent patients, I can ask her what equipment they use if this helps ?
Hi @DiabeticDi ,
I am not visually impaired myslelf, but I will tag a T1 @Carl Wood . Who is & may help when online.
Hope this helps.
Hu, that would be brilliant if you could, thank you very much!
My eyes work just fine, so not an answer to your question, just a couple of rambling thoughts.
Are you eligible for a continuous glucose meter or a FreeStyle Libre that works with your phone? That way you would be able to have your glucose tests read out loud to you. (By a very scary voice, I must say. I just checked with my Freestyle Libre and the text to speech function works just fine, only my Dutch version sounds very unfriendly, even though my blood sugar was a nice 5.2).
For injections I can imagine you could count the clicks of your pen, depending on your doses. In my case, it would be fine for my mealtime insulin, which is hardly ever more than 14 units, but it would make me very nervous to trust I counted the clicks of my 78 units of long acting right.
To check the pen and needle you could squirt 2 units on your other hand and feel or smell if insulin came out.
How are you managing at the moment?
I appreciate sharing experiences with people having the same challenges is much better than outsiders chipping in, so I hope it's alright with you I came up with my own thoughts on it
By the way, your first message was in bold, is it helpful we now all post in bold with bigger letters or doesn't it make a difference because you use different tricks to read the forum anyway?
Hi
I have some visual impairment, glaucoma which means I have lost much peripheral vision, and diabetes related double vision. Even using just one eye I can't see things extremely close or extremely far away. For me, this has been progressive, so I have had time to get used to the right number of clicks or button presses on my pump and on my libre.
I must admit, more and more I find myself shoving an electronic device at somebody, and saying 'whats that number?'.
The pens are really useful, easy to feel and hear the dose clicking up. With the libre, you upload to a computer, and from then on figuring out trends and stuff is relatively easy for me (computer is adjusted for my vision). HTH
Hello
I don’t have visual impairment but during DAFNE, I did sit next to a woman who was visually impaired. She was put onto a list for freestyle libre and possibly a pump. The two gadgets give off a sound that she can differentiate between a high or low and on the libre reader, the numbers are big enough for her to see.
PS sorry I can’t make my text bold, the app won’t allow it.
[Mod bold of text edit.]
Unfortunately she’s been deployed to a ward on the hospital so might be a slight delay for a response, she will come back to me at some point and when I hear back I’ll let you know
My pump isn't too good at being readable, but I now know the pattern of up and sideways clicks to get what I want. I have a few pre-set doses labelled in caps, so can pick those out easily. Other pumps I have seen are better with larger text, but this one has a large insulin reservoir and I need that.HI, thank you so much for your reply. Can I ask, is your pump easy to read to dial up a dose? Do you have to use a magnifier to read it? This is my concern, is a pump going to b e any easier in that respect then a pen. Also, how do you cope when you are out and about> How do yo see well enough to see the numbers or dials? I rely so much on daylight and magnifying lamps, I wouldn't be able to take one of those out with me!
Sorry ab out the questionw but I cannot see how I can ever go out for the day etc and take insulin....home is the comfort zone for doing all this with equipment and so I feel a bit trapped. ;lDo you think I would qualify for a pump or cgm now that I am registered severely sight impaired?
Cheers
Diane
In addition to that, the phone app has a text to speech function, and the app works as soon as you unlock the phone, no menu's to work through before testing.The libre is great. Simple number of button pushes (one to test, two to switch off) and the number is quite big and solid black against white.
I am partially sighted due to retinopathy and used to need my husband to change my pump tubing which involved checking for bubbles. Blood tests were fine but I now have an FSL with phone reader which is easy to see and my main reason for having a Roche pump is that it has a cartridge system and \I can make the font bigger on the display screen when programming the basal amounts or taking up a bolus. Prior to the pump I listened to clicks on the pen.Hi that's great, thank you so much
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