One Response to “Travel States side, Insulin timings?”

1. admin says:

   February 27 at 9:14 pm

   In article <49esg6$…@bigguy.timeplex.com>, White_Ch…@timeplex.com (Chris White) writes:

   =       Hello People.
   =       This is my first time on internet so please be gentle with me
   =in the event of any Faux-pas.
   =       My wife has recently, 1.5 months ago, has been diagnosed as
   =insulin dependant. She currently jabs herself once per day with 12-16
   =U’s, normally 0900.
   

   Er, from the numbers you give, she is NOT insulin-dependent.  She’s using
   exogenous insulin, but she’s not [yet] insulin-dependent.

   =       I’m relatively sure it’s 100% slow acting insulin.

   OK.  That fits with NIDDM (non-insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus) using
   insulin, or not-yet full-blown IDDM (i.e., one way or another, she’s still
   producing substantial amounts of endogenous insulin).  She is NOT what’s
   commonly described as insulin-dependent.

   =       We are traveling to Los Angeles End of this week and I’m
   =looking for anybody with advice and experience. I’ll set out my
   =rough idea for the schedule, BUT I am fully open to critism.
   =0915 10 u’s insulin.
   =0940 Lightish Breakfast
   =1200 Snack
   =1415 lunch on flight
   =1800 sandwich provided by self Time US 1000
   =2200 8 U’s Jab                 time US 1400
   =2220 Sandwiches on Flight
   =2330 Land                      Time US 1530
   =US Time 1900 Evening Dinner
   =
   =I’d welcome comments with respect to this.

   Er, you haven’t given us anywhere enough information.  Well, maybe you have,
   sort of, but not explicitly.  You’ve got these "Time US" things here, and other
   times, but YOU HAVEN’T TOLD US WHERE YOU’RE STARTING!  OK, let’s try to figure
   it out.  You say you’re coming to LA.  Your schedule says that it’ll be 15:30
   in Los Angeles (I guess; you say US 1530.  You DO know that the United States
   spans at least seven time zones don’t you?), and that that corresponds to 23:30
   your local time.  Let’s see now, that’s a difference of 8 hours, with Los
   Angeles being earlier than your home time zone.  Sounds like you’re probably
   from Great Britain or thereabouts, if I recall correctly (and I may well not).
   At any rate, let’s look at the scedule, in terms of your starting time:

           =0915 10 u’s insulin.
           =0940 Lightish Breakfast
           =1200 Snack
           =1415 lunch on flight
           =1800 sandwich provided by self
           =2200 8 U’s Jab
           =2220 Sandwiches on Flight
           =2330 Land
           =0300 Dinner
   OK, you’re talking about being up for more than 18 hours.  I’d guess that a
   normal schedule (it would’ve been nice if you’d told us what the normal
   schedule is; without knowing that, it’s hard to guess how the schedule should
   be modified) would be something like:
           =0915 10 u’s insulin.
           =0940 Lightish Breakfast
           =1200 Snack
           =1415 lunch
           =2000 dinner
           =2200 8 U’s Jab
           =2300 snack
   If my guesses are correct, then chances are that the evening injection’s
   going to be a bit late for the sandwiches and a bit early for the dinner.
   Between the two, I wouldn’t expect any major problems.

   However, I *DO* perceive (and remember, perception and reality aren’t always
   the same thing) what seems to be a rather fundamental problem here, viz. a
   misunderstanding of what you should be looking at.  Look, one day of high blood
   sugar levels is not likely to have any significant adverse affects.  Same for a
   couple of days of odd levels.  What you should (in my opinion) be looking at is
   avoiding hypoglycemic episodes (no, they’re not likely to have any detrimental
   permanent effects, either, but the headaches are a real bitch, and if they
   sneak up on you, they CAN cause problems).

   From what you’ve told us of your wife’s situation, it seems likely to me that
   what you might want to do is, on the day you’re flying, take the morning
   injection as usual, delay the evening injection until as long before dinner as
   it normally is, and thereafter go onto your normal schedule (in local time, of
   course).  Clearly, from the fact that your wife is injectin only 18 units per
   day, she’s still producing a substantial amount of endogenous insulin (well,
   unless she weighs about 70 pounds or less, another detail you left out, but I
   suspect she weighs a bit more than that).  It that’s the case, then you’ve got
   a fair amount of leeway in your choice of amount of insulin to inject and
   timing for the injections.  But, in my opinion, anyway, for a one-shot (pun
   intended) deal like this, you want to avoid low blood sugar more than you want
   to avoid high blood sugar.  That means you want, more or less, to base your
   injection strategy more on meals yet to come rather than meals past (sorry, but
   it being this season, and having already made one pun, I can’t resist the
   sort-of pun there).

   Meanwhile, I’d advise you to try to learn more about what the logic underlying
   your wife’s usual injection schedule is.  Once you understand that, figuring
   out how to modify it for special circumstances gets a lot easier.
   —————————————————————————
   I  try  very  hard  to say exactly what I mean.  I’d appreciate it if you’d
   bear that in mind and not try to "interpret"  my  posts  to  fit  your  own
   preconceived notions if I’m posting in a serious thread.  Remember:  If you
   throw a strawman into a heated debate, flames are likely to be the result.