Pump failure.

Hi,

I am in Australia and the system here is that your private health fund buys your pump and then a Diabetic Educator (often in private practice) teaches you how to use it. About 15 months ago I received a letter from my pump manufacturers saying that my pump was now out of warranty (3 years). At Christmas time I asked my endocrinologist to put in an application on my behalf to my health fund for a new pump. I received notification yesterday saying that the replacement pump had been denied as it was "fully functional"!

Has anyone had a pump fail? What were the signs of approaching death? How old was the pump?

Currently the clip is unable to be put back onto the pump so I am carrying it in a pockets where it regularly bungees to the floor/pavement etc and I wear it in a sock pinned to PJs. This is causing damage to the outer skin but all appears to be working...
Helen

Your Private health will have a policy on replacement pumps. I'm with HCF and the last time I was notified of pump policy it was - every 5 years a replacement was covered & anything earlier was a co-payment pro-rata'd.

When I first got my Medtronic pump I was sure the inference was get a new one after 3 years. Later I was notified of the HCF policy (probably part of the letter they send send reminding you there is a 30day money back period if you find the Pump is not for you). When the 3 years was up I rang medtronic for advice, they stated that there was absolutely no reason why the pump would not last 5 years+. I am currently in my 4th year like you.

As for clip - You didn't state what pump you have. You should be able to buy them as an accessory from the pump supplier. I would be lucky to get 5 months out of the plastic ones from Medtronic the actual ratchet mechanism is plastic and simply wears out (usually a crack forms on the little actuator arm, eventually breaking off or the whole thing destroys itself if you get sufficiently hooked up on something.LOL). I splurged on the leather one & it has lasted nearly 3 years so far with no signs at all that its going to fail - Im pretty sure the clip mechanism is all metal.

Here's the link to the medtronic clips incase thats the pump you have.
http://shop.medtronic-diabetes.com.au/index.php?option=com_virtuemart&page=shop.browse&category_id=1&Itemid=116

Thanks, Rich,

I have an Animas pump...long story but could not get Medtronic to respond when I initially went on a pump and thought that if that was indicative of their service, I would go with Animas who had been most attentive when I first broached the pump topic...

Regret the decision as the CDE they recommended did not program my pump properly and I had difficulties getting started. Subsequent CDEs then denied all responsibility for helping me as they had not done the initial "pump start".

I plan to swap to Medtronic ASAP as I use between 70-80 units most days and the cartridge needs changing every second day!!

As I wear the pump on my waist line at the back on my R side i have slowly narrowed the slot for the clip. I have clips but can not slide them onto the pump. The last time it was a battle to put it in but then when it came time to download the data could not get it off.
Thanks for the info re expected life span.

Helen

What a shame Helen.

I have had nothing but a stellar experience with Medtronic. PA hospital organised everything for me & an appointment was made for the switch to pump. The Medtronic rep was there for the initial instruction and setup (they would not make any suggestions for actual ratios or basal rates - they are not qualified for that). But I was prepared with my DAFNE ratios which I converted to grams per unit which I dropped straight into the pump and they were just about perfect. Basal took less than a week to tune.

I get just shy of 3 days out mine, my BASAL alone is set at about 80 units per day at the moment.

FYI Medtronic downloads are wireless.