OmniPod Question
Friday, October 14, 2011 at 9:10AM Thanks for taking the time to help!
This morning as we were bolusing Arden for breakfast she began to complain that the insulin delivery was painful. It got worse and worse, she was grabbing at her arm and I thought she was going to cry. She begged me to stop the delivery and I did. I immediately decided that I'd change the site right away.
When I removed the pod I saw this..
;)
click photo for enlargement
Hopefully you can see in the photo that the pod was compressed too tightly on her arm and in created an impression. We quickly realized that her new pajama top had tighter sleeves then her other tops and that the squeezing caused the issue. I want to be clear that this isn't an OmniPod issue.
My question to the adults out there wearing an OmniPod is this...
Because Arden is seven, sometimes her descriptions of events aren't everything that a young Jessica Fletcher would hope for as she tries to figure out a mystery. If this has every happened to you, can you please try to describing the level of pain that would be associated with this incident. Also, I'm trying to figure out if removing the night shirt and waiting would have alleviated the issue and how accurate Arden's response was to the discomfort. Plus any thing else that your feedback can teach me.
Thank you in advance!
Scott Benner
via Twitter - from @ Diabeteen:
@ArdensDay hey I've had that problem a couple of times and I understand her pain. It really is a stinging so bad it forces me to change pods
@ArdensDay only happened a couple of times this summer and that's the first time I experienced it. Pushing down helps for insulin delivery,
@ArdensDay but afterwards I change it immediately.
Scott Benner
via Twitter - from @Sarah_IGTS:
@ArdensDay In essense, yes, it does hurt. The cannula gets pushed deeper and can irritate nerves or muscle tissue. If that happens,...
Scott Benner
via Twitter - from Sarah_IGTS:
@ArdensDay ... it can feel like you're getting a pretty bad intramuscular flu shot. :-( Hugs to Arden!!
Insulin Pump, OmniPod, PWD in OmniPod Blog
Reader Comments (6)
My four year old daughter has also mentioned a couple of times that she had pain with insulin delivery (also with the pod on her arm), so I am curious to see what other people say about it.
I'm going to post the responses that I received via Twitter as a follow up to this post.
I understand the pain she is discribing. I have been wearing a pump for about 10 years and had this type if pain probably every 6 months or so, I haven't really figured out what has caused it but it seems like the cannular hit a little nerve. And, it does happen when I wear tighter clothes. There really is no way of knowing where the nerves are and the only thing to do is change the site. BTW I am 37 years old and have had Type 1 diabetes for 30 years !! I have no serious complications and have a beautiful 6 year old healthy boy without diabetes !! Keep up the strong work it all pays off !! Hope that helps and pls. email me if u have any questions.
Hi Scott,
Yes, Grace has had this happen. Sometimes from tighter than normal pants, the waistline may push against the Pod, and sometimes tighter than normal sleeves, Iike Arden's experience, has done it. Grace never has complained about stinging at all, so I'm not sure I can comment about that. We have seen the indentations from the area near the cannula though. Sorry I cant be of more help about the stingiing.
I've never used the OmniPod but when I used the Quick-sets with my MiniMed, I would have those indentations almost every time I took my pump off. Now with the Sure-T I don't get them anymore.
Like everyone else is saying, sometimes infusion sets just hurt. I haven't been able to figure out why in order to prevent it.
My son Jaime is 8 yrs old, and sometimes he says that he feels a burning like sensation; especially if he is using the pod on the belly. Only once he complained about real pain after a pod change, he was in so much pain that I had to remove the pod. He had bursts of blood for a couple of minutes.
Good luck on our D-adventure!