Guest guest Posted November 17, 2010 Report Share Posted November 17, 2010 HI Harry, The way a pump works is that it takes your basal dose and delivers it throughout the entire day. Long-acting insulin like Lantus does this by spreading out the insulin absorption over a 12 or 24 hour period, while the pump does this by delivering tiny amounts of insulin every few minutes. But the actual basal dose that your body needs stays pretty similar no matter how you get that insulin delivered. So, for example, if you take 25 units of Lantus a day and were to start on an insulin pump, your basal rate on the pump might be that it delivers 1.05 units of insulin per hour (25 units divided by 24 hours in a day). This is how a starting basal rate would be determined (though it might be decreased slightly because many people find they need less insulin when using a pump since it is more precisely matched to what their body needs at any given time). And if a pumper decides to take a break from the pump, they add up their basal rates (which the pump does automatically) and just take that much Lantus in one or two shots per day. For example, my pump says I take a total of 25.8 units a day delivered as basal insulin, so if I wanted to take a break from the pump and go back to using Lantus and Humalog, I would take 26 units of Lantus. The power of the pump, of course, is that while you might start out with a flat delivery of 1.05 units/hour throughout the entire day, there may be some times of day when you need a bit more basal insulin, so you might put your basal rate up to 1.15 units/hour during the early morning hours to cover the dawn phenomenon. You may also find there are periods during the day when you need less basal insulin, so you might put your basal rate down to 0.95 units/hour during the afternoon to avoid going low. You can figure out what your basal insulin needs are by skipping meals and seeing if your blood sugar rises or falls during the period; if your basal rate is set correctly your blood sugar should stay relatively flat when you skip meals or overnight. Hopefully this all makes sense. The pump is more complex than shots because it offers more precision, but the basic idea of providing a baseline of insulin all day and night and providing boluses of insulin to cover carbohydrates or high blood sugar is the same. Jen Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted November 18, 2010 Report Share Posted November 18, 2010 /////wonderful . Harry, to show the differancemy basal Rae is onl10.2 units per 24 hour period and I add more insulin from my pump (called a bolus) when I count carbs during the day. I usually need only 5-7 more units during the day. The pump is set to give me on .5 unit per touching the bolus button. But tese pumps can be set to bolus at as small as micro unit to as uchas 10 units at time. (the 10 unit mark might be incorrect. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted November 18, 2010 Report Share Posted November 18, 2010 /////wonderful . Harry, to show the differancemy basal Rae is onl10.2 units per 24 hour period and I add more insulin from my pump (called a bolus) when I count carbs during the day. I usually need only 5-7 more units during the day. The pump is set to give me on .5 unit per touching the bolus button. But tese pumps can be set to bolus at as small as micro unit to as uchas 10 units at time. (the 10 unit mark might be incorrect. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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