Hi,
I am a new T1D for only one month. I will need to travel to Italy on August 19 for 10 days. I am taking multiple insulin shots (before three meals and one at bedtime). Does anyone have experience in dealing with time zone change with respect to insulin injection time?
Thank you,
Gigi
Hi, Congrats on your trip to Italy! Wish I were going too. I travel abroad quite a bit. I recently switched to a pump and have not traveled since, but look forward to it. Previously I was on multiple insulin shots and this is what I did, which worked for me. I set an alarm on my phone for the time I always give my basal shot (in my case Lantus). In the US it was 7 AM and in the UK that was 12PM (lunch). This worked perfectly for me as there really is no reason to change the 24 hour injection time (unless it is in the middle of the night and you would prefer to sleep). Then I gave the bolus injections with each meal as usual. It all worked out just fine for me.
If you happen to be a before bed type of basal injector then it might be a little tricky. Lets say in the US you dosed at 10PM, that would be 3AM in Europe. I would check with your Doctor but I would think that waiting until first light in the morning would not have much of an impact. Most of us use less basal insulin overnight until our body is getting ready to wake in the morning. I believe I was told that plus or minus an hour each day is fine. Then after a few days you can be doing a morning dose of long term that is comfortable for you. Then going back hourly to our nights when you return will work too. Good luck and have a GREAT trip!
Also, everyone’s situation is different, but one day when I had to take my Mom for surgery, I totally forgot to take my basal dose and although my sugars read a bit higher than I would have liked, I compensated with the meal time bolus’s and was fine. If I think about how long I was stressing my body with high sugars before I was diagnosed, one day of slightly higher numbers was not going to kill me. Just being aware of my body and how I was feeling was what kept me from overdoing things. Carry Keto strips in with your kit of insulin and BG test strips. If you have any questions please feel free to contact me as I am more than happy to help! I know how stressful it feels to be newly diagnosed. Just relax and trust your instincts 
I was diagnosed April 2016
I was in Italy 2014 and didn’t really make any major changes. I still took my Humalog insulin with meals but be careful. I found I took less insulin which I attribute to all the fresh ingredients used in Italy rather than all the processed foods we seem to eat in the United States. With my long lasting Lantus insulin since I split my injections between morning and evening I would take my evening Lantus on the flight to Italy at my normal time but based on the time zone in Italy so I had already adjusted my evening injections before I even landed in Italy. Couple other suggestions. Be sure you have enough insulin and I take an extra test kit which my wife carries since I had an experience once where I forgot my test kit in a restaurant and foreign test kits are on the metric system so a bit more challenging to use since you have to always convert the data. I have a CGM so I also make sure I have an extra sensor just in case I have a bad sensor. Hope this helps.
I was in Europe, several counties including Italy, 2 years ago. I’m in the CST in the US and take multiple daily injections. I switched up my Lantus and took it in the morning instead of before bed. This was suggested by my former Endo and others. If I needed a meal time bolus, that was not impacted by the time change.
WOW I spent quite some time yesterday responding to you and it is not here. Bad interface I guess. Let’s see if I can reiterate.
Hi, Congrats on your trip to Italy! Wish I were going too. I travel abroad quite a bit. I recently switched to a pump and have not traveled since, but look forward to it. Previously I was on multiple insulin shots and this is what I did, which worked for me. I set an alarm on my phone for the time I always give my basal shot (in my case Lantus). In the US it was 7 AM and in the UK that was 12PM (lunch). This worked perfectly for me as there really is no reason to change the 24 hour injection time (unless it is in the middle of the night and you would prefer to sleep). Then I gave the bolus injections with each meal as usual. It all worked out just fine for me.
If you happen to be a before bed type of basal injector then it might be a little tricky. Lets say in the US you dosed at 10PM, that would be 3AM in Europe. I would check with your Doctor but I would think that waiting until first light in the morning would not have much of an impact. Most of us use less basal insulin overnight until our body is getting ready to wake in the morning. I believe I was told that plus or minus an hour each day is fine. Then after a few days you can be doing a morning dose of long term that is comfortable for you. Then going back hourly to our nights when you return will work too. Good luck and have a GREAT trip!
Also, everyone’s situation is different, but one day when I had to take my Mom for surgery, I totally forgot to take my basal dose and although my sugars read a bit higher than I would have liked, I compensated with the meal time bolus’s and was fine. If I think about how long I was stressing my body with high sugars before I was diagnosed, one day of slightly higher numbers was not going to kill me. Just being aware of my body and how I was feeling was what kept me from overdoing things. Carry Keto strips in with your kit of insulin and BG test strips. If you have any questions please feel free to contact me as I am more than happy to help! I know how stressful it feels to be newly diagnosed. Just relax and trust your instincts
I was diagnosed April 2016
Hi, Congrats on your trip to Italy! Wish I were going too. I travel abroad quite a bit. I recently switched to a pump and have not traveled since, but look forward to it. Previously I was on multiple insulin shots and this is what I did, which worked for me. I set an alarm on my phone for the time I always give my basal shot (in my case Lantus). In the US it was 7 AM and in the UK that was 12PM (lunch). This worked perfectly for me as there really is no reason to change the 24 hour injection time (unless it is in the middle of the night and you would prefer to sleep). Then I gave the bolus injections with each meal as usual. It all worked out just fine for me.
If you happen to be a before bed type of basal injector then it might be a little tricky. Lets say in the US you dosed at 10PM, that would be 3AM in Europe. I would check with your Doctor but I would think that waiting until first light in the morning would not have much of an impact. Most of us use less basal insulin overnight until our body is getting ready to wake in the morning. I believe I was told that plus or minus an hour each day is fine. Then after a few days you can be doing a morning dose of long term that is comfortable for you. Then going back hourly to our nights when you return will work too. Good luck and have a GREAT trip!
Also, everyone’s situation is different, but one day when I had to take my Mom for surgery, I totally forgot to take my basal dose and although my sugars read a bit higher than I would have liked, I compensated with the meal time bolus’s and was fine. If I think about how long I was stressing my body with high sugars before I was diagnosed, one day of slightly higher numbers was not going to kill me. Just being aware of my body and how I was feeling was what kept me from overdoing things. Carry Keto strips in with your kit of insulin and BG test strips. If you have any questions please feel free to contact me as I am more than happy to help! I know how stressful it feels to be newly diagnosed. Just relax and trust your instincts (I was diagnosed April 2016)
Hi friends - thank you all for your replies and valuable suggestions! Totally appreciated!
-Gigi