Saturday, August 18, 2012

Insulin Pump

When I had just turned 18, my doctors, parents and I decided that an insulin pump would be the best way to manage my diabetes.  The insulin pump allows me to give myself insulin without having to give shots.  I change the site every 3-4ish days and tell the pump how much insulin to give according to my blood sugars and the amount of food I have eaten.  After receiving the pump in the mail however, I freaked out about it (I mean really who wants to be connected to something all the time) and asked my parents to send it back.  After talking through it a bit more, we decided that I should at least be trained on it before making that decision. 
Well 9+ years later, I am still LOVING my Medtronic Insulin Pump. On my last pump upgrade, I got a blood sugar meter that "talks" to my pump so that once the blood sugar appeared, I could put in the food I was eating and it would suggest an amount of insulin for me to give. 
I just got a new one that has even more features and although I am sure most of you will not care, I am excited, so I'm sharing.
The best feature of my new pump is that I now have a CGMS: Continuous Glucose Monitoring System (aka tests my blood sugar all the time).  
My pump is on my left side (you can see the cord coming from it) and my CGMS is on my right side.  Both "sites" are changed out weekly or a few times a week by me. 
My CGMS checks my blood sugar in increments throughout the day and wirelessly tells my pump.  My pump sets off alarms if my blood sugar is too high or too low and then keeps a graph of the day so that I can see my blood sugar patterns. (This is my pump)

It also came with a USB that connects to their website.  It will wirelessly upload the information from my pump (blood sugars, insulin given and food eaten) and I can share this information with my doctor.  It is amazing!

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