Checking at night with pump

[Bsbllmom]

I was reading another thread about waking at night to test. A few of you said that pre pump you didn't test that often and now with they pump you get up and test. Why is that? Christian is on MDIs and I only test if he has had an unexpected low during the day or of he was really active during the day. We are planning on going on the pump in April. So why do you wake up more with the pump than without?

[shirley83006]

my daughter does not use the pump, you know it seems like hard work and more worrys. i think i will stick with the needles like my daughter wants. i will not push her on it.

[Bsbllmom]

I'm starting to think the same thing. With bad sites, ketones more often, infections and pump malfunctions MDIs sound pretty good right now.:cwds: I didn't read the pump threads too much because I am still learning different things. I figured I wouldn't overwhelm myself with pump stuff until we were ready to start the pump stuff. Now I am starting to rethink it.

[Nancy in VA]

We actually do less checking overnight with the pump than we did with MDI. Emma would often have overnight lows with Lantus, so we had to check. On the pump, the one basal that we know is set well is the overnight basal. So, basically if we have her in a good range at 10 or 11pm, we don't check her overnight. Well, we don't PLAN to check her overnight. If one of us wakes up we go ahead and check her. But, we often have a midnight check and then not another until 7:30am. Since one of us is usually still awake at midnight, its not that big of a deal

[mollysmom]

I think it's just personal preference. We did not usually check in the middle of the night while Molly was on Lantus. Now that she's on the pump we only do night checks if we have a weird day or if I want to see if her basal rates are adjusted properly.
We only made adjustments to Molly's Lantus dose if she was waking up too low or high.
With the pump I can make adjustments that would affect Molly's bg through out the night. The only way to do that is to get up and check bgs more frequently during the night. When I think that I have everything set correctly, then I'll stop checking as much probably.

Take care:)

[jdr]

We have always tested during the night.

[Hollyb]

I think middle of the night lows are just as, or more, likely with injections.

However, with a pump you have the opportunity to fine-tune the basal to match your child's natural cycle -- so if, for example, he tends to drop low at 2 am, instead of carbing him up so he's high enough at bedtime to withstand the drop you can adjust the pump to give less basal at that time so he doesn't go low. And if he tends to jump up high at dawn, like many do, you can program the pump to give more basal to counteract that morning high.

The catch is to do it right you have to test a lot to see what the pattern is, and then to see if you've programmed the basal right to get an even blood sugar most nights. You don't HAVE to do this -- you can use the pump more like Lantus, and give a steady amount of basal and just make sure you aren't having lows. But if you want to take advantage of the pump's ability to give you more even sugars through the night, then it means a lot of night testing.

[Charmed7]

I have these same questions, as we are just starting our pump. But a lot of the times I look at the poster's profile and find the child on the pump is really young. When my son was diagnosed at 4, we would check middle night all the time. As we became more comfortable and he became more predictable, we test less at night. I've only done it twice this year.

I think you have to just weigh your pros and cons. Is better overall control worth the occasional mishap. I compare "forgetting a bottle of insulin at the house" to a "bad infusion set one afternoon".

My other thinking was, what does it hurt to give it a try. If it doesn't work for us at this juncture, then we can go right back to MDI's.

Goodluck with your decision.

Charmed

[Norajane]

It seems to go in spurts. We get the basals right and then sleep through the night. She gets sick and then things go wacky we have to reset basals but then we get it right and we sleep again. It is alot of waking up in the middle of the night sometimes. BUT I wouldn't trade our pump back for MDI for anything! We are so happy pumping it has made a huge difference in our lives and her A1C.
I agree that the age of your child makes a big difference in consistancy. My DD is only 4 and it is really hard to get any stability in her #'s. The pump has helped us tremendously with that, not to mention psychologically as well. Poking her for every snack or cup of milk she has all day just sucks for us. Good Luck with your decision.