Living with Diabetes

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  • Trip tomorrow

    I’m a bit anxious. I packed everything yesterday, and I’m glad I did because I forgot personal hygiene items. Got them in the bag today.

    I really need to pick up a paperback book somewhere, maybe on the way home from dog class.

    I’ve got my security stuff printed out, and I will probably print out tomorrow’s and a boarding pass tomorrow — or maybe just wait on the boarding pass until I check my luggage.

    Flight is at 7:45, and I figure on leaving here at 5:00. I know it is early, BUT I figure the more time I give them and myself to solve problems, the better.

    I hear other countries are not allowing syringes at all — which I’m not taking anyway, but am taking pen needles and lancelets.

    I’m not even taking a computer this trip, but am taking two USB mini drives and my Treo. I am going to make sure that I can erase every thing on the one, and bring back stuff if I need to.

  • Husband

    He seems to be feeling better. His stress test is set for next Wednesday.

    He’s taking tomorrow off, which makes me very happy.

  • Dana Pumps

    DANA Diabecare USA LLC Warning Letter

    This is sad, because people’s lives are at stake here.

    The link takes you to the letter the FDA sent to Dana.

  • Whoops!

    Yahoo! Health

    I didn’t pick this pump at all, because they had a horrible website.

  • Husband

    He saw primary care physician who is moving at a normal rate. Had an EKG and blood tests, they are going to schedule a stress test.

  • Yeah, someone should have handed me a meter years ago…

    Dia Care — Abstracts: Nichols et al. 27 (8): 1879

    This article shows that some doctor 10-15 years ago should have handed me a blood sugar monitor and had me do something about all this. Doubt I was ready to deal with it yet.

    As I told my husband tonight … at least I have something that I can change and see immediate effects. Nothing quite like getting on the treadmill with a blood sugar of way, 190, and getting off 30 minutes later and seeing it at 120.

  • Good news for Therasense

    Dia Care — Abstracts: Kovatchev et al. 27 (8): 1922

    It seems to work fairly well, and at least better than random arm/finger prickings.

    CDE thinks they will be out end of year or beginning of next. FDA

  • I find this fascinating…

    Found this abstract on the Children with Diabetes website.

    First, remember that I have been raising and training dogs for over 20 years, and I generally know more about the dog diseases my breeds of choice have than human diseases….

    Second, I’ve been accused of being a statistical voyarer.

    Entrez PubMed

    What’s fascinating is that cats get Type 2 with prevelance based on breed and diet. Dogs get Type 1 based on diet. And pancreatic damage from too much fat is very common. Back when I trained Police K9s, my biggest job was putting dogs on diets.

  • Roche’s Accu-Chek Compact

    I’m experimenting with the Compact meter, and I am finding out some interesting things.

    First, it isn’t compact. It’s at least one third more of the mass of the Flash. Meaning that it probably won’t fit in my immediate bag. Second, it’s SLOW!

    Something interesting is that I NEVER get a decent test the first few times ou use a new meter. First of all, you have to lose some muscle memory, and learn new habits. If you test any length of time at all, you have a ritual. Or at least I do.

    If you are a meter manufacturer, I highly recommend you do what Accu-check does. Don’t throw in 10 lousy strips. Put in at least 50 strips. Accu-check puts 3 drums in their sample box, and my CDE gave me three more drums. That means I have 102 to play with.

    Why did they pick 17 tests? It isn’t even divisible by anything. I’d have put 15 in, and made it smaller. Or 10. Weird.

    After about 3 tests, the results on the two meters started converging. At first they were as much as 50 points apart, and now I am getting tests with 10 points of each other, which is as much as you can ever hope for.

    Fun little factoid — you never get a real number on a blood sugar test, all you are getting is trends. That’s even true with the A1C — actually more true, because that’s a so called 3 month average, but it doesn’t really work quite that way either.

    Just have to learn which trends to follow when it comes to correcting.

    So I haven’t decided which to go with, but I’m definately going to go with one more round of Freestyle while the copay is still $80, not $120.

  • Now my husband is having issues…

    He has some sort of congential heart defect and won’t share at all what it is or about. He really had problems with it when he had his hip repaired last year. Well, he’s been sick all week, has all the sympthoms he’s been told to watch for, and is going to the doctor tomorrow.