Recent Posts - DAFNE Online

Oct 3, 2014

MelDent35 5 posts

Topic: General Discussion / Just finished my course today. ..

I finished today too and it has totally blown my mind. There was stuff I didn't know even after 35 years with Type 1. I'm not great at mental arithmetic but I haven;t found the dose and CP calculations too hard so if I can do it anyone can. I only got grade E in GCSE Maths. I already feel like I;m back in control as my control has been terrible in recent years. For the first time I see myself as being the one to make Diabetes fit into my life and not the other way round. I also switched from Lantus to Levemir mid week. It's early days but it already seems to be helping I'm really going to miss the people from my course on Monday after spending a whole week with them. We have follow up on 13th November and I already can't wait to see them all again and find out how they're getting on.

Oct 3, 2014

MelDent35 5 posts

Topic: General Discussion / Lantus - Splitting

I heard you can't split Lantus. I had tried taking it just at night for a while and then in the morning for a while but it really didn't work for me. During my dafne course this week I have switched to taking Levemir twice a day. It's early days and I'm only on 10 units twice a day to start with but the truth is Lantus didn't work for me. If you want to try a split insulin I recommend you ask your healthcare team about switching to Levemir or another type that CAN be split.

Oct 3, 2014

MelDent35 5 posts

Topic: General Discussion / Planning for a Baby...Advice Needed

Iffat said:
Hello...

I have been married almost a year and would love to have a baby. What advice can other mums with type 1 give to me? I haven't started trying as only got diagnosed a month ago and my last HBA1C was 104 so i know this needs to come down?

What is a healthy HBA1C to start trying for a baby?

What do my BGL need to be? At the moment i have managed to stabilise my blood sugar levels so its going from approx 4.5-11, most days it stays around 6-8 since i've started taking insulin.

Any advice would be massively appreciated xx

I have had Type 1 for 35 years (I'm 39) and have never wanted kids as I don;t feel it is fair to inflict an increased risk of Type 1 on another human being plus I have no maternal instinct.. I became a Dafne graduate today but because I was the only woman in my group who was of the age where having a baby is still possible I was singled out. Didn't your dafne educator give you info on pregnancy with Type 1? My Hba1c is really bad, the last was 102. I wish you the best of luck with getting pregnant and having a healthy successful pregnancy. Very Happy

Oct 3, 2014

wigworld 19 posts

Topic: General Discussion / New Glucose testing system

The 15 minutes lag time is a fair point, but how often is that really an issue for most people? In terms of accuracy, they claim that the variation from blood glucose is around 10%, and that's better than the variation between different brands of BG test strips.
Sorry, I sound like a salesman for the system - I'm not!

Oct 3, 2014

stephenbrowne 37 posts

Topic: General Discussion / New Glucose testing system

I saw an advert for this system on the back of Balance magazine. I'm on an insulin pump and find I need to do about 10 tests a day so I was very inteerested. Two things put me off : the price, and the fact that if measues interstitial fluid sugar rather than blood sugar so is 15 minutes behind the true blood sugar. Nevertheless only needing to change it every 14 days is an advantage and it is easy to see trends.

Oct 2, 2014

wigworld 19 posts

Topic: Carbohydrate Counting / Jelly Babies

I find 3 jelly babies is approx 1 CP (M&S or Morrisons brand).

Oct 2, 2014

wigworld 19 posts

Topic: Carbohydrate Counting / Grapes/fruit generally

I love ripe bananas (that most people would say have gone off!) and I certainly find they raise my BG more than am 'ordinary banana'.

Oct 2, 2014

mum2westiesGill 502 posts

Topic: General Discussion / BG diary help please (mum2westiesGill diary)

Can anyone see any trends

Any help in identifying trends and/or advice on how to improve my control would be greatly appreciated

Thank you

Oct 2, 2014

wigworld 19 posts

Topic: General Discussion / New Glucose testing system

I saw that price of Â£48 per sensor somewhere, but it wasn't clear if that was the retail price or trade price. The NHS pay trade price, so I guess around Â£30 a fortnight. I test 5 or 6 times a day at the moment, which costs the NHS around Â£45-Â£50 a month. The sensors would cost the NHS around Â£60 a month. (If Â£48 per sensor is the trade price, however, that increases, obviously). The NHS would also save on the cost of lancets (though they're not expensive).
I think it's unlikely they would be allowed unless Abbott could show evidence of definite benefits (i.e. a definite reduction in HbA1c). I also think that they will generate so much data that most people with Diabetes will be unable to use them effectively - for this reason I think, at first anyway, they might only be available for DAFNE graduates.
The NHS commissioning arrangements might mean that availability on of the sensors on prescription is likely to vary from area to area - i.e. there may be a 'postcode lottery' as to whether you can have one or not.

Oct 1, 2014

SimonC 78 posts

Topic: General Discussion / New Glucose testing system

This does look quite good - a sort of half way house between CGM and pricking - I would like to try it out, as pricking is a pain (no real pun here as it doesn't hurt me), but I suspect that the NHS will be slow to adopt. I see that someone is giving a cost of approx Â£48 per sensor, I suspect the this will drop if other companies come out with rival systems. Approx Â£100 per month may seem a bit high, but the strips and lancets for the finger pricking also cost the NHS - the companies love to give out the monitors free as then they will make a lot of money from GP's prescribing the strips, and if, as in Type 1 you need to do quite a lot of testing, then this can add up - I did a very quick and rough estimation.

On Amazon - in the US a box of 50 accu-check strips costs $32 - approx Â£20, and if you did 4 tests a day for an average month of 30 days, this equals 120 strips used - 2 and a half boxes - about Â£50 per month for the strips.

I didn't do a check on the cost of lancets - as I rarely change mine - yes I know!

So currently strips are very roughly half the cost of this new system, and so I suspect that it will come down to what sort of improvement in lifestyle you can claim will result in using the new sensors and whether the GP thinks that is worth it or not.

I think that many will be able to make a good case - as in driving, it is quick and easy, and will ensure that Type 1 diabetics comply with the DVLA requirements - and therefore help with general road safety. It is less intrusive, for many less painful, the info given helps give an informed view over a period of time - so you can see if the levels are rising or dropping - which can help prevent hypos, less risk of infection, and ultimately may help in long term control which will bring down the cost of long term complications (unfortunately the NHS and GP's don't think long term as they can only deal with budgets for the short term).

Any way, thats my two penneth worth, I would try them if offered.

Oct 1, 2014

Gareth H 12 posts

Topic: General Discussion / New Glucose testing system

that looks great but very similar to the ipro2 thing they put on you for 7 day monitoring...while i found that very helpful i also found it annoyingly uncomfortable after a few days!

Sep 30, 2014

CurlyWurly 15 posts

Topic: General Discussion / New Glucose testing system

I seen this on the diabetes.co.uk forum - looks great and I would love it. The chances of the NHS funding it instead of strips though is pretty low for now I would imagine. It seems the sensors only last 2 weeks and cost approx. Â£48 each. Free strips but finger pricks Vs. Â£100 a month.

Sep 30, 2014

Muna A H 34 posts

Topic: General Discussion / New Glucose testing system

I searched this product. Seemed amazing. I hope it will be available in Australia soon Very Happy

http://www.diabetesmine.com/

Cheers

Muna

Sep 30, 2014

Alan 49 284 posts

Topic: General Discussion / New Glucose testing system

I'd like to get one of these when they become available:

https://www.freestylelibre.co.uk/default.aspx

Sep 30, 2014

Gareth H 12 posts

Topic: General Discussion / Hypos - All Over The Place

the trouble with reducing the lantus again is that they say most people need 24 units to go through an entire day, and you are already well below that.

Have you thought about maybe diverting some of that lantus? like moving even 4 of it to a morning injection so that you have 12 evening and 4 morning? just to see what it does.

I am new to all this reading stuff as i only did DAFNE last month but i cannot see a specific pattern in those readings that would say to reduce the lantus.

Sep 29, 2014

Simon 578 posts

Topic: Site Development / DAFNE Online iPhone application - help with content/design needed

Hi Linda,

It sounds like you haven't updated your iPhone for a while, and the app requires some of the latest apple updates to run. You can update to the latest version of iOS by following the instructions here https://support.apple.com/kb/HT4623

Thanks,

Simon

Sep 28, 2014

mdadds 1 post

Topic: General Discussion / IBG STAR - reliable readings??

Hi, yes I had a big problem with the BG Star, I also thought this meter would be easier to one less thing to carry, I called the makers of this meter and was told that the meter was the most accurate meter on the market. I explained that there was a difference of 2 to 4 of a difference and they said my one touch meter was way out, so I told them if I used there meter I would not take enough or to much insulin they said that wouldn't happen, what a laugh. That was the end of BGStar.
Regards
Mdadds

Sep 28, 2014

Linda flash 13 posts

Topic: Site Development / DAFNE Online iPhone application - help with content/design needed

Simon said:
Hi Linda,

Which iPhone or iPad do you have?

Hi Simon I have the iphone 4s

Sep 28, 2014

James270377 1 post

Topic: Site Development / DAFNE Online iPhone application - help with content/design needed

Hi all,

I am using the dafne app which transfers to the diary on here but for some reason my breakfast one doesn't, all other entries work fine, is there a reason or something I'm doing wrong?

Thanks

James

Sep 27, 2014

mum2westiesGill 502 posts

Topic: General Discussion / Hypos - All Over The Place

Wondering whether I'm better reducing lantus again or even changing to levemir

Sep 27, 2014

Simon 578 posts

Topic: DAFNE Online Mobile / iPhone 6

Ah - the default view in the settings app isn't ysed any more so you should see all of your entries as you add them to the app

Sep 27, 2014

Simon 578 posts

Topic: Site Development / DAFNE Online iPhone application - help with content/design needed

Hi Linda,

Which iPhone or iPad do you have?

Sep 26, 2014

gessie 2 posts

Topic: General Discussion / IBG STAR - reliable readings??

Hi Everyone,
After finishing the DAFNE course earlier this year (2014) I wanted to switch to the iBG STAR BG monitoring system because it worked with my iPhone and meant there was one less thing to always carry around - since I could get rid of my old OneTouch BG metre.
I tried it for about 14 days. Since I was changing meters, I kept track of the readings on the iBG STAR by cross-correlating with my old One Touch machine - taking two readings each time I checked my BG. The BG results as shown by the two machines differed significantly - the iBG STAR always giving higher values with the differential increasing as the BG values rose higher - say a difference of 2 units at normal BG measurements rising to 4 or more units difference at high BG values.
Since my overall balance wasn't bad with the One Touch system - which gave readings that I knew and was used to ('trusted' isn't quite the word! - but I had an idea how many units of QA were needed to counteract a particularly high BG - just from experience) I stopped using the BG STAR and returned to carrying all the clobber - a phone PLUS a BG meter - around with me again.
I was wondering if anyone else has any experiences with the BG STAR being either a system that gives good results (for them) OR like me found the machines to be a bit unreliable. I'd still like to park the old One Touch BG meter - which I'm using again - even if just for efficiency's sake - but I can't trust the iBG STAR system's readings.
Cheers.

Sep 26, 2014

Linda flash 13 posts

Topic: Site Development / DAFNE Online iPhone application - help with content/design needed

Hi
I tried dowloading the iphone dafne app but it tells me the application requires ios 7.0 or later,
How do I do this please?

Linda

Oct 3, 2014 MelDent35 5 posts	Topic: General Discussion / Just finished my course today. .. I finished today too and it has totally blown my mind. There was stuff I didn't know even after 35 years with Type 1. I'm not great at mental arithmetic but I haven;t found the dose and CP calculations too hard so if I can do it anyone can. I only got grade E in GCSE Maths. I already feel like I;m back in control as my control has been terrible in recent years. For the first time I see myself as being the one to make Diabetes fit into my life and not the other way round. I also switched from Lantus to Levemir mid week. It's early days but it already seems to be helping I'm really going to miss the people from my course on Monday after spending a whole week with them. We have follow up on 13th November and I already can't wait to see them all again and find out how they're getting on.

Oct 3, 2014 MelDent35 5 posts	Topic: General Discussion / Lantus - Splitting I heard you can't split Lantus. I had tried taking it just at night for a while and then in the morning for a while but it really didn't work for me. During my dafne course this week I have switched to taking Levemir twice a day. It's early days and I'm only on 10 units twice a day to start with but the truth is Lantus didn't work for me. If you want to try a split insulin I recommend you ask your healthcare team about switching to Levemir or another type that CAN be split.

Oct 3, 2014 MelDent35 5 posts	Topic: General Discussion / Planning for a Baby...Advice Needed Iffat said: Hello... I have been married almost a year and would love to have a baby. What advice can other mums with type 1 give to me? I haven't started trying as only got diagnosed a month ago and my last HBA1C was 104 so i know this needs to come down? What is a healthy HBA1C to start trying for a baby? What do my BGL need to be? At the moment i have managed to stabilise my blood sugar levels so its going from approx 4.5-11, most days it stays around 6-8 since i've started taking insulin. Any advice would be massively appreciated xx I have had Type 1 for 35 years (I'm 39) and have never wanted kids as I don;t feel it is fair to inflict an increased risk of Type 1 on another human being plus I have no maternal instinct.. I became a Dafne graduate today but because I was the only woman in my group who was of the age where having a baby is still possible I was singled out. Didn't your dafne educator give you info on pregnancy with Type 1? My Hba1c is really bad, the last was 102. I wish you the best of luck with getting pregnant and having a healthy successful pregnancy.

Oct 3, 2014 wigworld 19 posts	Topic: General Discussion / New Glucose testing system The 15 minutes lag time is a fair point, but how often is that really an issue for most people? In terms of accuracy, they claim that the variation from blood glucose is around 10%, and that's better than the variation between different brands of BG test strips. Sorry, I sound like a salesman for the system - I'm not!

Oct 3, 2014 stephenbrowne 37 posts	Topic: General Discussion / New Glucose testing system I saw an advert for this system on the back of Balance magazine. I'm on an insulin pump and find I need to do about 10 tests a day so I was very inteerested. Two things put me off : the price, and the fact that if measues interstitial fluid sugar rather than blood sugar so is 15 minutes behind the true blood sugar. Nevertheless only needing to change it every 14 days is an advantage and it is easy to see trends.

Oct 2, 2014 wigworld 19 posts	Topic: Carbohydrate Counting / Jelly Babies I find 3 jelly babies is approx 1 CP (M&S or Morrisons brand).

Oct 2, 2014 wigworld 19 posts	Topic: Carbohydrate Counting / Grapes/fruit generally I love ripe bananas (that most people would say have gone off!) and I certainly find they raise my BG more than am 'ordinary banana'.

Oct 2, 2014 mum2westiesGill 502 posts	Topic: General Discussion / BG diary help please (mum2westiesGill diary) Can anyone see any trends Any help in identifying trends and/or advice on how to improve my control would be greatly appreciated Thank you

Oct 2, 2014 wigworld 19 posts	Topic: General Discussion / New Glucose testing system I saw that price of Â£48 per sensor somewhere, but it wasn't clear if that was the retail price or trade price. The NHS pay trade price, so I guess around Â£30 a fortnight. I test 5 or 6 times a day at the moment, which costs the NHS around Â£45-Â£50 a month. The sensors would cost the NHS around Â£60 a month. (If Â£48 per sensor is the trade price, however, that increases, obviously). The NHS would also save on the cost of lancets (though they're not expensive). I think it's unlikely they would be allowed unless Abbott could show evidence of definite benefits (i.e. a definite reduction in HbA1c). I also think that they will generate so much data that most people with Diabetes will be unable to use them effectively - for this reason I think, at first anyway, they might only be available for DAFNE graduates. The NHS commissioning arrangements might mean that availability on of the sensors on prescription is likely to vary from area to area - i.e. there may be a 'postcode lottery' as to whether you can have one or not.

Oct 1, 2014 SimonC 78 posts	Topic: General Discussion / New Glucose testing system This does look quite good - a sort of half way house between CGM and pricking - I would like to try it out, as pricking is a pain (no real pun here as it doesn't hurt me), but I suspect that the NHS will be slow to adopt. I see that someone is giving a cost of approx Â£48 per sensor, I suspect the this will drop if other companies come out with rival systems. Approx Â£100 per month may seem a bit high, but the strips and lancets for the finger pricking also cost the NHS - the companies love to give out the monitors free as then they will make a lot of money from GP's prescribing the strips, and if, as in Type 1 you need to do quite a lot of testing, then this can add up - I did a very quick and rough estimation. On Amazon - in the US a box of 50 accu-check strips costs $32 - approx Â£20, and if you did 4 tests a day for an average month of 30 days, this equals 120 strips used - 2 and a half boxes - about Â£50 per month for the strips. I didn't do a check on the cost of lancets - as I rarely change mine - yes I know! So currently strips are very roughly half the cost of this new system, and so I suspect that it will come down to what sort of improvement in lifestyle you can claim will result in using the new sensors and whether the GP thinks that is worth it or not. I think that many will be able to make a good case - as in driving, it is quick and easy, and will ensure that Type 1 diabetics comply with the DVLA requirements - and therefore help with general road safety. It is less intrusive, for many less painful, the info given helps give an informed view over a period of time - so you can see if the levels are rising or dropping - which can help prevent hypos, less risk of infection, and ultimately may help in long term control which will bring down the cost of long term complications (unfortunately the NHS and GP's don't think long term as they can only deal with budgets for the short term). Any way, thats my two penneth worth, I would try them if offered.

Oct 1, 2014 Gareth H 12 posts	Topic: General Discussion / New Glucose testing system that looks great but very similar to the ipro2 thing they put on you for 7 day monitoring...while i found that very helpful i also found it annoyingly uncomfortable after a few days!

Sep 30, 2014 CurlyWurly 15 posts	Topic: General Discussion / New Glucose testing system I seen this on the diabetes.co.uk forum - looks great and I would love it. The chances of the NHS funding it instead of strips though is pretty low for now I would imagine. It seems the sensors only last 2 weeks and cost approx. Â£48 each. Free strips but finger pricks Vs. Â£100 a month.

Sep 30, 2014 Muna A H 34 posts	Topic: General Discussion / New Glucose testing system I searched this product. Seemed amazing. I hope it will be available in Australia soon http://www.diabetesmine.com/ Cheers Muna

Sep 30, 2014 Alan 49 284 posts	Topic: General Discussion / New Glucose testing system I'd like to get one of these when they become available: https://www.freestylelibre.co.uk/default.aspx

Sep 30, 2014 Gareth H 12 posts	Topic: General Discussion / Hypos - All Over The Place the trouble with reducing the lantus again is that they say most people need 24 units to go through an entire day, and you are already well below that. Have you thought about maybe diverting some of that lantus? like moving even 4 of it to a morning injection so that you have 12 evening and 4 morning? just to see what it does. I am new to all this reading stuff as i only did DAFNE last month but i cannot see a specific pattern in those readings that would say to reduce the lantus.

Sep 29, 2014 Simon 578 posts	Topic: Site Development / DAFNE Online iPhone application - help with content/design needed Hi Linda, It sounds like you haven't updated your iPhone for a while, and the app requires some of the latest apple updates to run. You can update to the latest version of iOS by following the instructions here https://support.apple.com/kb/HT4623 Thanks, Simon

Sep 28, 2014 mdadds 1 post	Topic: General Discussion / IBG STAR - reliable readings?? Hi, yes I had a big problem with the BG Star, I also thought this meter would be easier to one less thing to carry, I called the makers of this meter and was told that the meter was the most accurate meter on the market. I explained that there was a difference of 2 to 4 of a difference and they said my one touch meter was way out, so I told them if I used there meter I would not take enough or to much insulin they said that wouldn't happen, what a laugh. That was the end of BGStar. Regards Mdadds

Sep 28, 2014 Linda flash 13 posts	Topic: Site Development / DAFNE Online iPhone application - help with content/design needed Simon said: Hi Linda, Which iPhone or iPad do you have? Hi Simon I have the iphone 4s

Sep 28, 2014 James270377 1 post	Topic: Site Development / DAFNE Online iPhone application - help with content/design needed Hi all, I am using the dafne app which transfers to the diary on here but for some reason my breakfast one doesn't, all other entries work fine, is there a reason or something I'm doing wrong? Thanks James

Sep 27, 2014 mum2westiesGill 502 posts	Topic: General Discussion / Hypos - All Over The Place Wondering whether I'm better reducing lantus again or even changing to levemir

Sep 27, 2014 Simon 578 posts	Topic: DAFNE Online Mobile / iPhone 6 Ah - the default view in the settings app isn't ysed any more so you should see all of your entries as you add them to the app

Sep 27, 2014 Simon 578 posts	Topic: Site Development / DAFNE Online iPhone application - help with content/design needed Hi Linda, Which iPhone or iPad do you have?

Sep 26, 2014 gessie 2 posts	Topic: General Discussion / IBG STAR - reliable readings?? Hi Everyone, After finishing the DAFNE course earlier this year (2014) I wanted to switch to the iBG STAR BG monitoring system because it worked with my iPhone and meant there was one less thing to always carry around - since I could get rid of my old OneTouch BG metre. I tried it for about 14 days. Since I was changing meters, I kept track of the readings on the iBG STAR by cross-correlating with my old One Touch machine - taking two readings each time I checked my BG. The BG results as shown by the two machines differed significantly - the iBG STAR always giving higher values with the differential increasing as the BG values rose higher - say a difference of 2 units at normal BG measurements rising to 4 or more units difference at high BG values. Since my overall balance wasn't bad with the One Touch system - which gave readings that I knew and was used to ('trusted' isn't quite the word! - but I had an idea how many units of QA were needed to counteract a particularly high BG - just from experience) I stopped using the BG STAR and returned to carrying all the clobber - a phone PLUS a BG meter - around with me again. I was wondering if anyone else has any experiences with the BG STAR being either a system that gives good results (for them) OR like me found the machines to be a bit unreliable. I'd still like to park the old One Touch BG meter - which I'm using again - even if just for efficiency's sake - but I can't trust the iBG STAR system's readings. Cheers.

Sep 26, 2014 Linda flash 13 posts	Topic: Site Development / DAFNE Online iPhone application - help with content/design needed Hi I tried dowloading the iphone dafne app but it tells me the application requires ios 7.0 or later, How do I do this please? Linda