We get up in the morning and it’s another beautiful day. We don’t expect anything to go wrong but we all have our busy schedules, we are all in rush to get to work or school, and the pressures of life are always surrounding us when all of a sudden out of nowhere on one of these beautiful days SHIT will HAPPEN. SHIT HAPPENING is an almost inevitable part life. To me it’s happened a number of times and if you haven’t guessed what I’m talking about it’s an INSULIN INJECTION mistake. The mistake can come in many forms but it’s as scary as hell for anyone who has ever gone into insulin shock or has experienced extreme hypoglycemia. I think every TYPE-1 diabetic and the parents of children with TYPE-1 diabetes will find this post interesting and possibly relate to some of the things I describe. Nothing in this post however are supposed to replace or change the medical help or instructions that you have gotten from your doctor or will get in the future. Many diabetics have started using CGM (Continuous Glucose Monitoring) devices instead of glucometers which I mention a lot in this post. Things are continuously changing but I sincerely hope there are diabetics out there who will find this post helpful to them.
OMG (Oh My God) I just overdosed on INSULIN. To me as a type-I diabetic probably the biggest fear I have is overdosing on insulin. I’ve gone into diabetic shock twice in my life when I was much much younger – once on the tennis court and once after I managed to park my car while driving to work. I’ve learned my lessons the hard way – that low blood sugar should never be ignored. I literally have freaked out on more occasions than I’d like to even think about because of the fear of an episode of hypoglycemia. I’ve yelled at myself (something like WTF did I do), my heart has skipped beats and depending on what exactly I did or didn’t do I’ve given myself self inflicted panic attacks. In short I fully understand any diabetic who fears hypoglycemia. Today I know how to handle most of these hypoglycemic situations but I also know that severe low blood sugar can kill me or put me in a coma. So if I do freak out I freak out quickly and get over it. There’s no time to waste and there should be nobody better prepared than yourself to treat your low blood sugar episodes as well as to prevent it from happening if you know that at attack is imminent. Here are some (first hand) examples of things that could happen….
- Accidently taking 2 rapid acting insulin injections like LISPRO. This has happened to me on a few occasions and it’s scary. Sometimes I take my rapid insulin injection before my meals and other times I take it after eating. Taking the injection both before the meal and then again after is a hypoglycemic event in the making. Mistakes like this don’t happen often to me but when you take many injections throughout the day to keep your blood sugar levels in check and then add life’s usual stress to the equation- things can go wrong. Depending on how extra insulin I’ve taken this could be a pretty serious situation if I don’t treat it quickly. Unfortunately when SHIT HAPPENS you can’t take it back — you have to deal with it!!
- Taking a high dosage of rapid acting insulin that I didn’t need to take. This has happened to me occasionally and the reasons for taking large injections are usually not a mistake. Since I balance my blood sugar with different dosages of rapid acting insulin throughout the day the amount of insulin I take usually depends on what sort of meal I’ve eaten and what my blood sugar is to begin with. When I see my blood sugar levels are very high and seemingly out of control the way to get it back under control is with a rapid insulin injection. Taking a large dosage of rapid acting insulin seems the right thing to do – correct? Well usually… but sometimes for whatever reason SHIT HAPPENS or maybe MURPHY IS WORKING OVERTIME and you or I can get a false high reading on our trusty glucometer . This doesn’t happen very often and shouldn’t happen but if SHIT is meant to happen it will happen! Glucometers are not fool proof and sometimes need calibration and even taking a bIood test from fingers which aren’t clean can cause faulty readings. Generally I check twice when I see a very high blood glucose reading on my glucometer – especially if this glucose reading is the reason I am going to take another injection (which I normally wouldn’t take!!). Unfortunately (for me) there have been tmes I’ve shot first and checked later. Ever wonder why you always see your mistakes after you’ve made them — well it’s probably because if you saw them before you made them then you wouldn’t make them and they wouldn’t be mistakes!! I am pretty convinced that it always pays to WASTE another blood glucose testing strip before you shoot yourself with more insulin. I usually make sure my hands are clean the second time! Seeing high blood sugar numbers on my glucometer have always been upsetting to me which has sometimes contributed to me making quick and sometimes bad decisions. Whenever taking an added or extra dose of insulin make sure you really need it!!.
- This mistake happened to me a few months ago (and I actually hadn’t made this mistake before… guess I missed one) – This time I took the wrong type of insulin and mistakenly injected my rapid acting lispro insulin instead of taking my long acting LANTUS insulin. Since my long acting LANTUS injection is at a much higher dosage than my rapid acting lispro injection this was an OMG mistake. I had to act fast to get my blood sugar up to avoid getting a very dangerous case of hypoglycemia. Despite a lot of initial fear I suffered no ill effects or hypoglycemia.
Summing the above up – we are all human, we all make mistakes and SHIT does HAPPEN and MURPHY DOES EXIST and comes out of nowhere when you least expect him. If you are a type-1 diabetic you need to know how to deal with situations like this and be always be prepared.
What Now – you think you just made an OMG (insulin injection) mistake!!
I’ve said it before — try not to freak out – I know what you’re going through. First off once you calm down take a minute to think about what you really did. In times of fear/stress etc… your mind can play tricks on you. Did you really take those 2 injections, did you really take the wrong insulin, how much addition insulin did you inject etc.. From my experiences there’s been many times I’ve thought I might had made a bad mistake when I hadn’t. Do not add insult to injury by making an even worse mistake!! Bringing up your blood sugar levels by going on an eating spree when you didn’t actually take the wrong injection is only going to cause you lots of unnecessary blood sugar problems — so take a minute to think what you actually did! If you don’t remember if you took an injection or not do NOT run to take that missed injection without thinking or trying to check what you did. My cardinal rule which usually works for me is when in real doubt — I do not take another injection until I am 100% sure that I didn’t take the one I thought I skipped or missed. Keep testing your blood sugar until you’re sure what happened. If you feel the need then talk to your doctor and definitely tell some family member or close friend what is going on!. I personally WHEN IN DOUBT prefer to control any high blood sugar levels which might be caused by a missed or forgotten injection with small dosages of rapid acting insulin than run the risk of accidently taking a double dose of rapid acting insulin.
The Unthinkable Oh My God (OMG) insulin injection mistake happens to you!!
You now know for sure that you just took that extra injection or a big overdose of insulin. There is very little time to waste from here on. Rapid acting insulins such as lispro starts working after a short amount of time so getting your blood sugar level up quickly before the insulin reaches it’s maximum peak is essential in preventing a bad case of hypoglycemia or going into insulin shock. First thing I do now is to test my blood sugar and know where I stand. This is one of those times where high blood sugar levels are a welcome guest to me. In one of my previous posts I talked about insulin curves and how important it is to know how your insulin works. Rapid acting insulin usually has a peak between 30 minutes to 3 hours. There are many different brands of insulin on the market and each has it’s own specific action curve – and the curve of quick acting REGULAR insulin is different than rapid acting insulin LISPRO. If for example your insulin reaches it’s peak after 30 minutes and then tapers off after 3 hours then getting your blood sugar up quickly is essential but once the insulin starts tapering off (and your blood sugar levels are not low) then you know you’ve probably dodged the bullet of hypoglycemia. Don’t forget however that dodging the hypoglycemia bullet doesn’t always mean you are out of the woods. High blood sugar (because of consuming excessive amounts of glucose/carbohydrates to prevent hypoglycemia) is a real threat which must be recognized. Bringing low bood sugar up too high and then taking injections to lower it can become a real ROLLER COASTER ride for diabetics.
HOW DO I GET MY BLOOD SUGAR UP and still AVOID a ROLLER COASTER RIDE AND CYCLE OF LOW & HIGH BLOOD SUGAR LEVELS?
If I didn’t mention it I’ll say it here (and again and again) that a diabetic needs to BE PREPARED -ALWAY!!. Being prepared and ready for an imminent hypoglycemic emergency means having 2 things with you at all times. The first is a working functional GLUCOMETER with many glucose test strips available. The last thing you want in an emergency is to find you’re out of strips or your glucometer battery has ran out. Murphy is always lurking around every corner – don’t help him!! Always have a spare battery and a spare bottle of blood testing strips for your glucometer – it could save your life or save you a trip to the ER (emergency room of your nearest hospital). The next thing in your survival kit are glucose tablets. Keep LOTS OF THEM at hands reach just in case of an emergency!! I never move without them – at work, in the gym or beside my bed when I go to sleep. The glucose tablets are also available in liquid form if you prefer. I think it’s probably worth keeping both of them on hand!
Unfortunately I don’t know of any magic pills or remedies that in one BANG will get your blood sugar back to normal after overdosing on a large amount of insulin. Below is the method that I use to treat my hypoglycemia when any medical emergency arises.
1 First I try to make sure I know what happened. There’s a big difference between treating yourself for a major overdose of rapid acting insulin or having a hypoglycemic reaction due to perhaps a missed meal or excessive physical activity or exertion. Hypoglycemia that is not caused by a major insulin overdose – which is probably the usual case that unfortunately plagues diabetics most of the time should be treated quickly by consuming glucose tablets (or other glucose sources) immediately to bring up the blood sugar. After I consume the glucose tablets I usually check my blood sugar again after 15 or 20 minutes to see that my sugar level is back around the normal range and I don’t need any additional glucose. If my blood sugar level is back to normal (and this was not brought on by a major overdose of insulin) then this bout of hypoglycemia is usually over and I can go back to my usual routine. Knowing the reason for any hypoglycemic reaction is always a big plus in treating it but the body is a very complex piece of machinery (as I keep learning everyday…) and sometimes the cause of both low and high blood sugar can be pretty evasive.
2. If I have discovered I’ve taken an overdose of insulin there’s not much time to waste. Even if my blood sugar is normal or high at the time this is not the time for complacency. As all type-1 diabetics know – rapid acting insulins work very fast but luckily (if you overdose) their peak duration time is shorter and the peak blood lowering action will be out of your system in around 3 hours . In this sort of emergency I try to increase my blood sugar immediately to a pretty high level (before the peak effects of the rapid insulin) again with the help of glucose tablets. This is hopefully before I start feeling the effects of the rapid acting insulin and getting a hypoglycemic reaction. Trying to prevent any hypoglycemic reaction is the main objective right now. Once the rapid insulin starts it blood sugar lowering magic it becomes a continuous routine of glucose testing and consuming glucose tablets or glucose syrup to keep my blood sugar levels from reaching any low danger point. I usually keep checking about every 15 or 20 minutes which is the time it takes for the glucose tablets to work. In overdose emergencies like I am talking about I’m not that worried about seeing some high glucose readings since the main objective is to dodge the bullet of extreme hypoglycemia or insulin shock. If my blood sugar remains around or above the level (or in the high range) from when I tested it last then there’s usually no reason to keep consuming more glucose. I do however keep testing for the entire duration that the rapid insulin is working at it’s peak. If during the peak period I see my blood sugar levels decreasing or going below “my safe zone” I resume consuming glucose tablets to raise my blood sugar.
I titled the above paragraphs as the ROLLER COASTER RIDE and HOW TO AVOID IT but never really got into details. I’m pretty sure that just about every insulin dependent diabetic knows what a roller coaster blood sugar trip is – when he or she has had a case of hypoglycemia only to eventually see his blood sugar skyrocket and then to get it down he or she must take additional injections which sometimes lead to additional cases of low blood sugar and in short – a vicious cycle which sometimes takes days to get your blood sugar back under control. I’ve had this happen to me and it’s never fun. One of the major reasons for my ROLLER COASTER rides have been the uncontrolled way I’ve used to raise my blood sugar levels which means I’ve either gone on a feast of eating cakes, cookies, ice-cream, sweet drinks etc… or otherwise a feast combined with glucose tablets as a sort of topping to the desert!! One of the reasons for my frantic eating was of course the FEAR FACTOR of the hypoglycemia but you always pay a price for gluttony when you’re a diabetic and it’s seldom worth it!!. The irony with these one man feasts that I gave myself is that most of the foods I was consuming despite being full of calories and sweet as sugar didn’t raise my blood sugar nearly as fast as glucose tablets do. Don’t forget that even sugar is part glucose and part fructose – and fructose raises the blood sugar slower than glucose. These sort of feasts can really turn into a diabetics LAST SUPPER….
Now For Some Simple Math about glucose (tablets and syrup)
I’ve talked about glucose tablets a lot throughout this post. The best, simplest and maybe the only way a diabetic can bring his blood sugar up in a CALCULATED way without running a really big risk of a ROLLER COASTER RIDE is by using glucose tablets in my humble opinion. Below is an example…
If you weight 100 pounds (45 kilogram) every gram of glucose will raise your blood glucose 5 units (mg/dl), if you weigh 150 pounds (68 kilogram) it will raise your blood glucose 4 units (mg/dl) and if you weigh 200 pounds (91 kilogram) it would raise your blood glucose level by 3 units(mg/dl). In short the less you weigh the more the glucose tablets raise your blood sugar. The math is simple. Lets say you’re a man weighing about 91 kilo (200 pounds) and your blood sugar is now in the hypoglycemia range of 50. Let’s say you want to get your blood sugar up to the 90-100 range as fast as possible. What do you do? First thought might be to grab a chocolate bar, piece of cake and wash it all down with some cola — but that is the wrong answer…. Here goes:
A 91 kilo man would increase his blood glucose levels by 3 points for each gram of glucose. If you are this man and you want to bring your blood glucose up from 50 to around 90 to 100 you need to raise your blood sugar between 40 to 50 units(mg/dl). The math here is 40/3 to 50/3 grams of glucose to get you there which comes to somewhere between 13 to 17 grams of glucose. The glucose tablets that I take are 4 grams per tablet but there are loads of different brands out there coming in different sizes. The man in question would have to take around 3 to 4 glucose tablets (of 4 grams glucose/tablet) in order to get his blood sugar up in the range specified. Even without a calculator most people can do this math in their head. Now try to do the same calculation but instead of the glucose tablets you take a piece of cake, some ice-cream, a chocolate bar and maybe some cola or possibly coffee and milk to wash it all down…. It’s pretty easy to see that if you’re a diabetic having glucose tablets with you at all times is a MUST.
Looking forward to user comments on this post.
4105total visits,6visits today
Leave a Reply