Insulin Pump!

I am a proud owner of an external pancreas. I was trained in its use today, and now just have to very closely monitor my bloodsugars (checking it 8-10 times a day) for the next few weeks as I work out the kinks. I'm psyched!

 

I read "insolence pump". Lol'd.

 

That is actually pretty funny. Heh, insolence. I wonder if anyone else misread that in a similar way...

 

Nope. My best friend's a Type 1 diabetic and she actually just got rid of her insulin pump and went back to injections.

 

Why would she ever do that? Having a regulated injection system would feel like being Frank Horrigan, which - needless to say - would be absolutely badass. Badass, I say. Do they provide power armors with those things? Not yet? A matter of time, I'm sure.



"Gross with a morning snack", artist's rendition of an inevitable future day-to-day sight.

 

Her insurance no longer covered the pumps.

 

Wow, I hope you heal well, Gross. Congratulations on your bionic upgrade. Good luck on the road to recovery.

 

Most of the patients I deal with love their pumps once they get a handle on how they work. In the long run the more continuous monitoring of your glucose levels will prove to be beneficial in reducing long-term effects of constant high sugars.

They're not for everyone, but I hope you take well to yours. If I ever had to give myself insulin I'd totally go the pump route as well.

 

The local UW managed to successfully transplant a pancreas in someone, and get it to take (I met the woman), but it took them three before one of them took. Evidently it's still technically experimental, and she has to go in for check ups every 3 or 6 months.

 

I heard of a man that got an experimental T-cell transplant (the cells that actually produce insulin for the pancreas) and only had to monitor his bloodsugars, along with taking immunosuppressant drugs to keep those hard to get cells. He also got semi monthly (maybe 3-6 months as well) checkups and effectively no longer has diabetes.
My diabetes was caused by a viral infection that my immune system freaked out about, causing it to devour all of my T-cells and cripple my pancreas. I can't grow more because of the damage, so immunosuppressants wouldn't help. I really don't mind having diabetes, it's more of a lifestyle change than anything else. Not really a debilitating ailment, unless you're stupid about it. I love the pump. Already my bloodsugars hover around 100-120 range, all I really have to do is eat to keep up with the constant flow of insulin. Not a bad deal. And if I find that I'm going to exercise, I can temporarily decrease my insulin basal rate by factors of 100, so instead of running full throttle I can knock it down to 75, 50, or even 10 percent if I have to for a set amount of time, upon the ending of the duration it returns to normal. Doing food is even easier because I have a whole catalog of edibles to select from already programmed into the pump, so I can set it to yogurt, fruit, meats, dairy, anything and simply add up the total insulin I need to take as a bolus. I forgot how convenient it was to have the pump after my last one, a Disetronic (now defunct, their product was crap) shorted out and delivered a high intensity stream of insulin. It lowered my bloodsugar so fast I couldn't think to disconnect it, plus the batteries made for the pump that I got in the mail were dead when I got them. All in all, a bad pump experience. I love my new one though. It's an Animas pump that syncs with my glucometer, so I can control what the pump does by checking my bloodsugar with it and calculating possible boluses.