Recent Posts - DAFNE Online

Sep 1, 2011

novorapidboi26 1,819 posts

Lizzie said:
I have looked at this again and still don't understand it. I was taught many of these on my DAFNE course and most have been proven by my own experience. Can someone who was there please go through these and explain what the truth apparently is and why we were misinformed so comprehensively? Not just on the DAFNE course but by our specialist doctors, nurses and dietitians for many years - at least in my case many of these things have been passed on to me as facts.

For example:

If BI doses should not be 12 hours apart, what is the ideal length between doses?

If 4u is not the maximum correction dose, what is?

If high BG prior to exercise should not always be corrected with QA, how should it be treated?

If you do not need a 1:1 ratio for snacks, what is the correct ratio?

If alcohol does not raise and then lower your blood sugar what effect does it have? And what is it that coincidentally causes the raising and lowering of blood sugars in people who have drunk alcohol if it is not the alcohol itself?

If an overnight hypo does not cause high morning BGs what is the cause?

What is the "floor" if it isn't 4? And what is that "treat or eat" thing all about? The treatment for a hypo IS eating.

With regard to this one "BG should be tested at 3am to make sure a hypo isnâ€™t the cause of high fasting BGLs" - does that mean you should never check your BGLs during the night? Surely this is a sensible action to take to find out what is happening? Why is it a myth or misconception that you need to do it?

"A 2-hr post-prandial BG is helpful to assess QA:CP ratio" - why not? Is this reading any use at all? If so what for? If not why have doctors been advising us to check it for so many years?

"High GI foods are in & out of the bloodstream very rapidly" and "Low GI foods can still be affecting your BG up to 5hrs after eating" - I thought that was the point of GI - it was a measure of how fast the food reacted in our bloodstream.

These slides seem confusing without the accompanying explanation.

If BI doses should not be 12 hours apart, what is the ideal length between doses?

Background insulin's dont always last 12 hours, and some even last longer, its effects are different in everyone...........its perfectly acceptable to have it 12 hours apart, i personally have mine 9 hours apart, one at night, one in early in the morning, this is to help combat the dawn phenomenon.........

If 4u is not the maximum correction dose, what is?

The possibilities are endless really, it all boils down to insulin sensitivity..............if my blood is over 17mmol/l, I have established that 1 unit drops me by 1mmol/l...........so if I was 20mmol/l which isn't that often... Wink

], to get down to 5.5mmol/l I would take 15 units [14.5]........this is a long way off 4 units maximum.......

If high BG prior to exercise should not always be corrected with QA, how should it be treated?

Depends when the exercise is taking place, if it was within 5 hours of CP/QA then you would have no need to do so...

If you do not need a 1:1 ratio for snacks, what is the correct ratio?

If its closer to your lunch, use your lunch ratio, if dinner, use dinner, if not........somewhere in between, its all about trial and error.......

If alcohol does not raise and then lower your blood sugar what effect does it have? And what is it that coincidentally causes the raising and lowering of blood sugars in people who have drunk alcohol if it is not the alcohol itself?

Depends on what you are drinking, if its just alcohol [spirits] then your BG will not go up, it will however go down either at the time of drinking, overnight and/or into the next day, everyone is different.........and by different I mean everyone's liver has different response times to dealing with the toxin.......
If its beer, cider, alcopops, some wines, then they will have carbs in them, to which you should account for...............in this case and the previous one a reduction in BI that night and sometimes into the next day are required.........

If an overnight hypo does not cause high morning BGs what is the cause?

I would say overnight hypos can be the cause of morning highs, but the next obvious one which myself and many others suffer from is dawn phenomenon, where a cocktail of hormones are released in order to raise blood sugar levels to assist in starting the day off............

What is the floor; if it isn't 4? And what is that treat or eat thing all about? The treatment for a hypo IS eating.

I would say 4 is fine for verging on hypo...............

Not sure about the treat or eat thing, its been a while since i looked at the myths and misconceptions, it may be referring to, if your hypo immediately before a meal, and then the question would be, do you treat it, or just eat your meal with a reduced QA.........I would always treat, then eat........just in case i was dropping quickly and there was no quick acting carbs on my dinner plate...........safety first and all that......................

Sep 1, 2011

Lizzie 87 posts

Topic: Carbohydrate Counting / Kendal Mint Cake

You can get it without the chocolate on, it is mainly available in outdoors type shops except in the Lake District. I have emailed the manufacturers about precise carb values and will report back if I get a response.

Sep 1, 2011

novorapidboi26 1,819 posts

Topic: Carbohydrate Counting / Kendal Mint Cake

Might need to try this out, the fact that its set in some kind of fatty [all oil is kinda fat] coating then it will be slowed, but maybe not as much as normal chocolate with lots of saturated fat...........

Sep 1, 2011

Lizzie 87 posts

Topic: General Discussion / DAFNE Myths

I have looked at this again and still don't understand it. I was taught many of these on my DAFNE course and most have been proven by my own experience. Can someone who was there please go through these and explain what the truth apparently is and why we were misinformed so comprehensively? Not just on the DAFNE course but by our specialist doctors, nurses and dietitians for many years - at least in my case many of these things have been passed on to me as facts.

For example:

If BI doses should not be 12 hours apart, what is the ideal length between doses?

If 4u is not the maximum correction dose, what is?

If high BG prior to exercise should not always be corrected with QA, how should it be treated?

If you do not need a 1:1 ratio for snacks, what is the correct ratio?

If alcohol does not raise and then lower your blood sugar what effect does it have? And what is it that coincidentally causes the raising and lowering of blood sugars in people who have drunk alcohol if it is not the alcohol itself?

If an overnight hypo does not cause high morning BGs what is the cause?

What is the "floor" if it isn't 4? And what is that "treat or eat" thing all about? The treatment for a hypo IS eating.

With regard to this one "BG should be tested at 3am to make sure a hypo isnâ€™t the cause of high fasting BGLs" - does that mean you should never check your BGLs during the night? Surely this is a sensible action to take to find out what is happening? Why is it a myth or misconception that you need to do it?

"A 2-hr post-prandial BG is helpful to assess QA:CP ratio" - why not? Is this reading any use at all? If so what for? If not why have doctors been advising us to check it for so many years?

"High GI foods are in & out of the bloodstream very rapidly" and "Low GI foods can still be affecting your BG up to 5hrs after eating" - I thought that was the point of GI - it was a measure of how fast the food reacted in our bloodstream.

These slides seem confusing without the accompanying explanation.

Sep 1, 2011

Lizzie 87 posts

Topic: Carbohydrate Counting / Kendal Mint Cake

Thanks. I think the peppermint oil is just a flavouring, it is basically pure glucose set in a bar. I just found it to be more palatable than glucose tablets and easier to carry around than lucozade.

Sep 1, 2011

Simon 578 posts

Topic: Carbohydrate Counting / Kendal Mint Cake

The oil is probably in the chocolate surrounding it - you can get varieties without choc so they might be slightly faster acting.

Sep 1, 2011

novorapidboi26 1,819 posts

Topic: Questions for HCPs / Dafne Diary entries for advice please

I look forward to it................ Wink

Sep 1, 2011

novorapidboi26 1,819 posts

Topic: Carbohydrate Counting / Kendal Mint Cake

from googling, it looks like a chocolate bar............is that the right one.............?

if so, its 95g of CHO for every 100g, so a 170g bar/cake is about 162g of CHO, so for the lot 16 unit[ x ratio]..........

it seems as though its pretty much all sugar and glucose syrup, which would be fine for a hypo, but it has oil in it, which will slow the absorption, and that's no good for a hypo............and you would be looking for about 15g out of the 170 to treat it, so I would imagine not a lot......

Sep 1, 2011

LindaJ 3 posts

Topic: Questions for HCPs / Dafne Diary entries for advice please

Thank you for responding. Only difference I know for definite is my holiday abroad which lasted until Sun 28th morning - much harder to achieve accurate CPs using restaurant.
Prior to these readings I took my BG at 3am on 2 separate occasions although I had had 1 CP before bed both times - results:
2330 1CP BG @ 6.2. Injected 1QA and @ 0325 BG 7.9 then on waking up @ 0700 BG @ 7.4.
and
2310 1CP BG @ 15.5! Injected 1QA + 3 corrective QA and @ 0300 BG @ 14.0 then on waking up at 0700 BG @ 13.3.
I will do again omitting the 1CP for supper and see what happens.
Many thanks - let you know the outcome.
Linda

Sep 1, 2011

John Syer 19 posts

Topic: DAFNE Online Mobile / Feedback from Android beta testing

KeithCl said:
But what problem you are hitting I'm not sure.

I worked out what the problem was, I was downloading via my WiFi connection at work, and the work proxy server had cached the original version I downloaded.
Once I tried again from home it worked a treat. Thwarted by technology once again ;-)

Regards, John

Sep 1, 2011

KeithCl 43 posts

Topic: DAFNE Online Mobile / Feedback from Android beta testing

John Syer said:

John,

I've just downloaded and installed again too and got the 1.3.r265. Just to be clear here this is a 2 step process: 1) use the browser on your phone to download the file; 2) click on the downloaded file to then be taken through the install or replace process.

But what problem you are hitting I'm not sure. To work around it I'll email you the file directly. Give me 15 mins.

Keith

Sep 1, 2011

Geofftrez 22 posts

Topic: DAFNE Online Mobile / Feedback from Android beta testing

I've got the new version from the download. Guess you did something silly John. Laughing

Sep 1, 2011

John Syer 19 posts

Topic: DAFNE Online Mobile / Feedback from Android beta testing

KeithCl said:
The "1.3.r265 BETA" is now available for download.

Hi Keith,

The version available on the site seems to be 1.0.r251 again.
I made sure that I cleared caches and even tried used a different machine to download it. Of course I'm willing to conceed that I've done something stupid.

Regards, John

Sep 1, 2011

Lizzie 87 posts

Topic: Carbohydrate Counting / Kendal Mint Cake

Does anyone know how many carbs are in this? It has nothing on the packaging to say. But during a recent holiday it seemed effective at treating hypos (nibbling a bit and guessing when to stop).

Aug 31, 2011

KeithCl 43 posts

Topic: DAFNE Online Mobile / Feedback from Android beta testing

The "1.3.r265 BETA" is now available for download. (The delay in posting was my fault.) It has these fixes in it:

6. Icons on the main screen no longer dimmed.
7. Values with a single decimal point are supported in the CP, QA and BI fields now as well as the BG field.
8. Previously entered comments are offered in an auto-complete list on the comment field after one character is entered.
9. The options menu has been re-arranged to make it a bit easier to jump into carb lists when editing a diary entry.
10. The BG average calculation has been corrected to ignore diary entries that have no BG value set.

and of course the earlier "1.1.r255 BETA" fixes are also there:

1. If in "Auto-Calculate QA" mode, update the QA value if either the CP value or the QA:CP value changes.
2. If the Type field is changed, always update the QA:CP field to the value stored in Targets.
3. Distinguish visually between a manually entered QA or QA:CP value and an automatically populated one (using italics for the latter) to provide a visual hint on what is going on.
4. Fix the bug identified earlier where a CP of 6+2 is only counted as 6 in the "Auto-Calculate QA" mode rather than as 8.
5. Fix the bug where when editing an existing entry the QA:CP ratio was always being set to the default (from the Targets) not the previously saved value.

You can upgrade preserving your existing data and settings by just installing again.

I'll be looking to create a release version at the end of this week.

Keith

Aug 31, 2011

novorapidboi26 1,819 posts

Topic: Questions for HCPs / Dafne Diary entries for advice please

Welcome,

A lot to take in there, have you any specific problems you are not sure about.........?

First thing I look at is whether you are holding steady overnight to see if the BI dose is right, you seem to be falling, all be it, there a other factors involved, like QA, but this would suggest maybe too much........

Have you tested your BI overnight with no carbs or QA in the system.........?

Sep 1, 2011 novorapidboi26 1,819 posts	Topic: General Discussion / DAFNE Myths Lizzie said: I have looked at this again and still don't understand it. I was taught many of these on my DAFNE course and most have been proven by my own experience. Can someone who was there please go through these and explain what the truth apparently is and why we were misinformed so comprehensively? Not just on the DAFNE course but by our specialist doctors, nurses and dietitians for many years - at least in my case many of these things have been passed on to me as facts. For example: If BI doses should not be 12 hours apart, what is the ideal length between doses? If 4u is not the maximum correction dose, what is? If high BG prior to exercise should not always be corrected with QA, how should it be treated? If you do not need a 1:1 ratio for snacks, what is the correct ratio? If alcohol does not raise and then lower your blood sugar what effect does it have? And what is it that coincidentally causes the raising and lowering of blood sugars in people who have drunk alcohol if it is not the alcohol itself? If an overnight hypo does not cause high morning BGs what is the cause? What is the "floor" if it isn't 4? And what is that "treat or eat" thing all about? The treatment for a hypo IS eating. With regard to this one "BG should be tested at 3am to make sure a hypo isnâ€™t the cause of high fasting BGLs" - does that mean you should never check your BGLs during the night? Surely this is a sensible action to take to find out what is happening? Why is it a myth or misconception that you need to do it? "A 2-hr post-prandial BG is helpful to assess QA:CP ratio" - why not? Is this reading any use at all? If so what for? If not why have doctors been advising us to check it for so many years? "High GI foods are in & out of the bloodstream very rapidly" and "Low GI foods can still be affecting your BG up to 5hrs after eating" - I thought that was the point of GI - it was a measure of how fast the food reacted in our bloodstream. These slides seem confusing without the accompanying explanation. If BI doses should not be 12 hours apart, what is the ideal length between doses? Background insulin's dont always last 12 hours, and some even last longer, its effects are different in everyone...........its perfectly acceptable to have it 12 hours apart, i personally have mine 9 hours apart, one at night, one in early in the morning, this is to help combat the dawn phenomenon......... If 4u is not the maximum correction dose, what is? The possibilities are endless really, it all boils down to insulin sensitivity..............if my blood is over 17mmol/l, I have established that 1 unit drops me by 1mmol/l...........so if I was 20mmol/l which isn't that often... ], to get down to 5.5mmol/l I would take 15 units [14.5]........this is a long way off 4 units maximum....... If high BG prior to exercise should not always be corrected with QA, how should it be treated? Depends when the exercise is taking place, if it was within 5 hours of CP/QA then you would have no need to do so... If you do not need a 1:1 ratio for snacks, what is the correct ratio? If its closer to your lunch, use your lunch ratio, if dinner, use dinner, if not........somewhere in between, its all about trial and error....... If alcohol does not raise and then lower your blood sugar what effect does it have? And what is it that coincidentally causes the raising and lowering of blood sugars in people who have drunk alcohol if it is not the alcohol itself? Depends on what you are drinking, if its just alcohol [spirits] then your BG will not go up, it will however go down either at the time of drinking, overnight and/or into the next day, everyone is different.........and by different I mean everyone's liver has different response times to dealing with the toxin....... If its beer, cider, alcopops, some wines, then they will have carbs in them, to which you should account for...............in this case and the previous one a reduction in BI that night and sometimes into the next day are required......... If an overnight hypo does not cause high morning BGs what is the cause? I would say overnight hypos can be the cause of morning highs, but the next obvious one which myself and many others suffer from is dawn phenomenon, where a cocktail of hormones are released in order to raise blood sugar levels to assist in starting the day off............ What is the floor; if it isn't 4? And what is that treat or eat thing all about? The treatment for a hypo IS eating. I would say 4 is fine for verging on hypo............... Not sure about the treat or eat thing, its been a while since i looked at the myths and misconceptions, it may be referring to, if your hypo immediately before a meal, and then the question would be, do you treat it, or just eat your meal with a reduced QA.........I would always treat, then eat........just in case i was dropping quickly and there was no quick acting carbs on my dinner plate...........safety first and all that......................

Sep 1, 2011 Lizzie 87 posts	Topic: Carbohydrate Counting / Kendal Mint Cake You can get it without the chocolate on, it is mainly available in outdoors type shops except in the Lake District. I have emailed the manufacturers about precise carb values and will report back if I get a response.

Sep 1, 2011 novorapidboi26 1,819 posts	Topic: Carbohydrate Counting / Kendal Mint Cake Might need to try this out, the fact that its set in some kind of fatty [all oil is kinda fat] coating then it will be slowed, but maybe not as much as normal chocolate with lots of saturated fat...........

Sep 1, 2011 Lizzie 87 posts	Topic: General Discussion / DAFNE Myths I have looked at this again and still don't understand it. I was taught many of these on my DAFNE course and most have been proven by my own experience. Can someone who was there please go through these and explain what the truth apparently is and why we were misinformed so comprehensively? Not just on the DAFNE course but by our specialist doctors, nurses and dietitians for many years - at least in my case many of these things have been passed on to me as facts. For example: If BI doses should not be 12 hours apart, what is the ideal length between doses? If 4u is not the maximum correction dose, what is? If high BG prior to exercise should not always be corrected with QA, how should it be treated? If you do not need a 1:1 ratio for snacks, what is the correct ratio? If alcohol does not raise and then lower your blood sugar what effect does it have? And what is it that coincidentally causes the raising and lowering of blood sugars in people who have drunk alcohol if it is not the alcohol itself? If an overnight hypo does not cause high morning BGs what is the cause? What is the "floor" if it isn't 4? And what is that "treat or eat" thing all about? The treatment for a hypo IS eating. With regard to this one "BG should be tested at 3am to make sure a hypo isnâ€™t the cause of high fasting BGLs" - does that mean you should never check your BGLs during the night? Surely this is a sensible action to take to find out what is happening? Why is it a myth or misconception that you need to do it? "A 2-hr post-prandial BG is helpful to assess QA:CP ratio" - why not? Is this reading any use at all? If so what for? If not why have doctors been advising us to check it for so many years? "High GI foods are in & out of the bloodstream very rapidly" and "Low GI foods can still be affecting your BG up to 5hrs after eating" - I thought that was the point of GI - it was a measure of how fast the food reacted in our bloodstream. These slides seem confusing without the accompanying explanation.

Sep 1, 2011 Lizzie 87 posts	Topic: Carbohydrate Counting / Kendal Mint Cake Thanks. I think the peppermint oil is just a flavouring, it is basically pure glucose set in a bar. I just found it to be more palatable than glucose tablets and easier to carry around than lucozade.

Sep 1, 2011 Simon 578 posts	Topic: Carbohydrate Counting / Kendal Mint Cake The oil is probably in the chocolate surrounding it - you can get varieties without choc so they might be slightly faster acting.

Sep 1, 2011 novorapidboi26 1,819 posts	Topic: Questions for HCPs / Dafne Diary entries for advice please I look forward to it................

Sep 1, 2011 novorapidboi26 1,819 posts	Topic: Carbohydrate Counting / Kendal Mint Cake from googling, it looks like a chocolate bar............is that the right one.............? if so, its 95g of CHO for every 100g, so a 170g bar/cake is about 162g of CHO, so for the lot 16 unit[ x ratio].......... it seems as though its pretty much all sugar and glucose syrup, which would be fine for a hypo, but it has oil in it, which will slow the absorption, and that's no good for a hypo............and you would be looking for about 15g out of the 170 to treat it, so I would imagine not a lot......

Sep 1, 2011 LindaJ 3 posts	Topic: Questions for HCPs / Dafne Diary entries for advice please Thank you for responding. Only difference I know for definite is my holiday abroad which lasted until Sun 28th morning - much harder to achieve accurate CPs using restaurant. Prior to these readings I took my BG at 3am on 2 separate occasions although I had had 1 CP before bed both times - results: 2330 1CP BG @ 6.2. Injected 1QA and @ 0325 BG 7.9 then on waking up @ 0700 BG @ 7.4. and 2310 1CP BG @ 15.5! Injected 1QA + 3 corrective QA and @ 0300 BG @ 14.0 then on waking up at 0700 BG @ 13.3. I will do again omitting the 1CP for supper and see what happens. Many thanks - let you know the outcome. Linda

Sep 1, 2011 John Syer 19 posts	Topic: DAFNE Online Mobile / Feedback from Android beta testing KeithCl said: But what problem you are hitting I'm not sure. I worked out what the problem was, I was downloading via my WiFi connection at work, and the work proxy server had cached the original version I downloaded. Once I tried again from home it worked a treat. Thwarted by technology once again ;-) Regards, John

Sep 1, 2011 KeithCl 43 posts	Topic: DAFNE Online Mobile / Feedback from Android beta testing John Syer said: John, I've just downloaded and installed again too and got the 1.3.r265. Just to be clear here this is a 2 step process: 1) use the browser on your phone to download the file; 2) click on the downloaded file to then be taken through the install or replace process. But what problem you are hitting I'm not sure. To work around it I'll email you the file directly. Give me 15 mins. Keith

Sep 1, 2011 Geofftrez 22 posts	Topic: DAFNE Online Mobile / Feedback from Android beta testing I've got the new version from the download. Guess you did something silly John.

Sep 1, 2011 John Syer 19 posts	Topic: DAFNE Online Mobile / Feedback from Android beta testing KeithCl said: The "1.3.r265 BETA" is now available for download. Hi Keith, The version available on the site seems to be 1.0.r251 again. I made sure that I cleared caches and even tried used a different machine to download it. Of course I'm willing to conceed that I've done something stupid. Regards, John

Sep 1, 2011 Lizzie 87 posts	Topic: Carbohydrate Counting / Kendal Mint Cake Does anyone know how many carbs are in this? It has nothing on the packaging to say. But during a recent holiday it seemed effective at treating hypos (nibbling a bit and guessing when to stop).

Aug 31, 2011 KeithCl 43 posts	Topic: DAFNE Online Mobile / Feedback from Android beta testing The "1.3.r265 BETA" is now available for download. (The delay in posting was my fault.) It has these fixes in it: 6. Icons on the main screen no longer dimmed. 7. Values with a single decimal point are supported in the CP, QA and BI fields now as well as the BG field. 8. Previously entered comments are offered in an auto-complete list on the comment field after one character is entered. 9. The options menu has been re-arranged to make it a bit easier to jump into carb lists when editing a diary entry. 10. The BG average calculation has been corrected to ignore diary entries that have no BG value set. and of course the earlier "1.1.r255 BETA" fixes are also there: 1. If in "Auto-Calculate QA" mode, update the QA value if either the CP value or the QA:CP value changes. 2. If the Type field is changed, always update the QA:CP field to the value stored in Targets. 3. Distinguish visually between a manually entered QA or QA:CP value and an automatically populated one (using italics for the latter) to provide a visual hint on what is going on. 4. Fix the bug identified earlier where a CP of 6+2 is only counted as 6 in the "Auto-Calculate QA" mode rather than as 8. 5. Fix the bug where when editing an existing entry the QA:CP ratio was always being set to the default (from the Targets) not the previously saved value. You can upgrade preserving your existing data and settings by just installing again. I'll be looking to create a release version at the end of this week. Keith

Aug 31, 2011 novorapidboi26 1,819 posts	Topic: Questions for HCPs / Dafne Diary entries for advice please Welcome, A lot to take in there, have you any specific problems you are not sure about.........? First thing I look at is whether you are holding steady overnight to see if the BI dose is right, you seem to be falling, all be it, there a other factors involved, like QA, but this would suggest maybe too much........ Have you tested your BI overnight with no carbs or QA in the system.........?