I am about to have my first insulin pump class tomorrow. i couldn’t be more excited!! But before I head off to pump land, I want to tell you about my latest discovery in insulin delivery, the insulin pen. When I was first diagnosed with diabetes seven years ago, I was given a pen, but soon after it was taken off of the market do to it malfunctioning or something like that. A few months ago my nurse asked me if I why I wasn’t using a pen and I told her I had no idea that they were back on the market. I was very excited to hear that they were back on the market and she gave me a few samples of the Novolog FlexPen. This is the handiest device I think, next to the pump! For those who are on shots, using the old bottle and syringe method, you may want to check this out.

I find this most convenient when eating out, or on the go because I don’t have to fumble around with a bottle, trying to squint in a dark restaurant trying to see if I sucked enough insulin into the syringe, all while trying to be discrete, and usually failing at it. The pen is an all in one device, it is recommended that the needles be changed at every use, but I would do it once a day since the only contaminant is me, it isn’t going back into a sterile bottle, so I should be fine. The biggest drawback is if you are very insulin sensitive, the type of pen I used only comes in full unit “clicks”. I think there are others on the market that may give half units, but for me the full unit dose works just fine.

How it works:

Fresh pen, screw a needle on, prime, and away you go!

After figuring out how many units you are going to need, you just dial in your dose by twisting the end to the right amount of units. In poor light you can hear and count the clicks (they are quiet), oh so discrete! Jab yourself (make sure you ask for the tiniest needles possible).

inject and viola! you are done! Only one bottle/needle to worry about, and easy to disguise if you are a little shy like me.

After reading around the diabetes world today I found out there is a pen on the market that has a digital aspect that will even remember the doses and times of your last 16 injections! How awesome is that for record keeping! That way you don’t have to find a pen to write it down immediately, or find your blackberry to log it into SugarStats. Geez! Wish I had this years ago! If it weren’t for all the extra functions of a pump and my need for the continuous glucose monitor (that needs the pump to work) I would be happy as a duck with a pen like that! (where do I get these bizarre little phrases?!)

Here’s a link to the HumaPen.
Be careful if you view their “tutorial”, I am notorious for multi-browsing (having many many webpages open at once) and it locked up my browser. So don’t be like me. Focus on one thing at a time if you are going to view it.