When should you adjust pump basal for it to have an effect?

[tim2000s]

Following on from an earlier question today, and based on an observation I made recently, what delay do you expect for each of your basal segments on your pump?

I use Novorapid and based on advice within the forum used to adjust the time segment two hours earlier than I wanted it to take effect. Following some playing with my rates, I noticed that the I was seeing the impact of an increased rate half an hour after the previous segment ended, so I did a few tests, and discovered that from a steady state, a change in the rate for a particular segment sees a noticeable change half an hour to 45 mins after the end of that segment.

We talk about basal testing a lot, and it's critical for getting pump levels right, but should we also encourage basal rate acting time testing? This would drive when we needed to adjust those basal rates to have an effective basal.

How would we do this? You'd do a fasted basal test, as per normal, then adjust one segment up by a significant percentage (perhaps by 100% depending on your basal levels) and see when it had an impact. Any other thoughts from people? Do you do this already?

 

[Chas C]

I worked out the dosage over time impact insulin has on me when fasting, added this to an XL table, plug in my basal rates then undertake a fasting basal test. I put adjustments in two hours before they need to impact, I've never felt the need to adjust the two hours.

I then use the table to calculate a revised basal - then make minor manual adjustments if they look incorrect.

Been doing this for four years and works fine for me.

 

[noblehead]

Must admit the 2 hour before adjustment works perfectly fine for me.