My daughter is 5 and has been on the Animas Ping insulin pump for 2.5 wks now. The Inset 30 is not as easy as I had thought it would be!! Extremely tedious and sensitive. Overall she is doing fairly well with the process only 2 times have they hurt her and during her saline start she had one bloody site. However last week she had very high BG # in the 400's even while being corrected. She had mod ketones once or twice and large ketones once. We were able to clear them fairly quickly and I changed the site twice.
I changed her basal rates during the time period as well. We are using the upper buttock area for her sites. We are rotating. Right now...knock on wood- hope I am not jinxing myself.....her numbers are good. However her pump team wants me to try the contact detach. They say it is lower site failure...more reliable...simpler. The only drawback they tell me is that if she was to fall on it, she will feel it. I asked if it would hurt her if she falls on it or physically harm her and they say no.
Wondering if we should try them? DO people like them? She is a tiny thing, which is why we tried the inset 30 BUT that needle is HUGE that we use to do it. I can't imagine her having enough fat/ for it not to hit a muscle.
My son is 5 and we have used the inset 30s for about 1 and half years - it is the only site we've ever used. I chose it because he is thin and doesn't have a lot of fat either.
I think it definitely takes some getting used to. We had several sites at first where I didn't get it in right and he told me it hurt right away. I always make him leave it in for at least a little while to make sure it wasn't just the after effects of the initial insertion but most of the time it wasn't. Now that I have lots of experience, we rarely have problems. There have even been a few times where his cannula was kinked when we removed it but he had had good numbers for the entire 3 day period. So I am a fan. I am scared to try any of the metal cannula sets and not that excited to try any of the straight sets either - and since we're having good luck, no real reason to try.
A couple things I have learned - and let me know if these don't make sense.
1. Make sure your daughter is not clenching her butt cheeks. I know that is probably hard for her not to do if she is anxious about it, but it makes the site go in a lot easier and hurt less.
2. Make sure you have the inserter flush against her skin before you fire it. It needs that to go in at the proper angle.
3. No need to push the inserter too hard on to her skin, just touching it. My husband tends to want to push down on it to make sure there is good contact and my son always says "Dad hurts more."
I guess it doesn't hurt to try the other sites. I think Animas will send you some samples for free, so you might as well. If something different works better, great. But if not, my feeling is that the inset 30s will get easier and more reliable for you over time. I know it took me at least a month before site changes didn't take us a half hour to do, it was just so much stuff to remember and I double (or triple) checked everything. Now I think it takes 5 min.
thank you so much for the advice!! I couldn't believe I didn't hear back from anyone after 2 posts!!! Prior to the "upgrade" on the site I always heard back from everyone, they are all so good on this site!!
Thank you so much for the advice, I really appreciate it. Animas sent me some of the metal sets but I am sticking it out to see if it gets any better. :) Thank you for the wonderful advice!
Hi Sara, My 3yr old daughter started pumping in April 2010. She also started with the inset 30, we were experiencing the same things you are now. We since switched to the contact detach and it works very well. My little one is also tiny with very little fat. We use her upper buttocks and rotate the site every three days with no problems. Hope this helps. God bless you and your little one
Hi Sara, My 3 yr old daughter started pumping in April 2010. She also started with the inset 30 we were experiencing the same things you are now. We sice switched to the contact detach and it works very well. Our little one is also tiny with very little fat. We use her upper buttocks and rotate the site every three days. Hope this helps. God bless you and your little one.
Hi Sara, My 3 yr old daughter started pumping in April 2010. She also started with the inset 30 we were experiencing the same things you are now. We sice switched to the contact detach and it works very well. Our little one is also tiny with very little fat. We use her upper buttocks and rotate the site every three days. Hope this helps. God bless you and your little one.
I would keep trying different infusion sets until you find one that works best. I've never been able to use my rear end for infusion sites because they bleed and I don't get good insulin absorption. I know your options are really limited since your daughter is so little. Does she have enough fat on upper arms or thighs to try a site there? Take care and let us know how it goes.