Friday, September 12, 2014

Exasperation Station.

Some days I really love my medical devices.

Can we talk about how terrifyingly Riddler-like that face is?


Today is not one of those days.




While my basal has been delivering just fine (I was shocked to see a mostly-straight line from overnight, hovering around 95), my bolusing ability has been stunted by some fault within my insulin pump's lineup. Ever since putting this cartridge in on Wedneday night, my pump has not been able to fully deliver a single bolus. Not of 10 units, not of 5 units, not of 2 units. No boluses.

WHY CAN'T YOU JUST WORK YOU EXPENSIVE LITTLE MACHINE.

I called Tandem's tech support, and their troubleshooting protocol asks me to disconnect at the leur lock to see if insulin is delivering before it gets to the tubing.

Here's the kicker: I see why they want to know this, but if I do this process I lose not only the 23 units of insulin in my tubing (I use the really long tubing), but also will have to prime all of those airbubbles that will be introduced into the tubing again, out. That's easily 53 units of insulin I'll be wasting, and I feel very uncomfortable with that thought. I don't like wasting such a precious resource. 53 units is more than a day's worth of insulin for a lot of people.

If the design of your medical device requires me to squander my limited supply of the only drug that can keep me alive, you may want to rethink that design.

So I guess I'll be over here injecting for each meal and snack until this cartridge runs out.

Hashtag first world problem.

UPDATE: According to the customer service rep I've been working with, Tandem Diabetes Care is sending me a new "goodwill" box of cartridges and a prepaid shipping label so I can mail back the faulty cartridge for "investigation purposes". Good on ya, Tandem. Let's hope these work.

Thursday, September 11, 2014

Lightning Speed.

Just a wee little update on the wee little Rabbit:




Who in the span of a few days has become more "kid" than "baby", to my eyes.

(Also, please ignore all of the stuff on my kitchen counter. Cleaning hasn't been a priority.)

Wednesday, September 10, 2014

Medicine X 2014: People.

I spent four days on the Stanford University campus in Palo Alto, CA for the Medicine X conference, and what, now I'm just supposed to go back to "real life"?

Emotions, energy, and spirits ran as high as my blood sugar. The #MedXHangover is real.


Every conference. Every time.

So much to say, so little time to blog.

What stands out to me most, in this moment of reflection:
  • The swift manner in which handshakes gave way to hugs
  • A purposeful and welcome focus this year on mental health
  • The epitome of a "powerful patient story", this Ignite talk from epatient and fellow T1D Erin Gilmer - seriously some of the most gut-wrenching three minutes of the conference, and she wasn't even there in person which speaks to how much weight her words had/have
  • How grateful I was to see Scott Strange in the hallway immediately after I left the stage to bolt to a safe place to "come down", and for the huge bear hug he gave me before I erupted in tears
  • My ah-may-zing roommate Carly, who is a large part of the reason I had such a positive experience
  • Finally meeting super-human Susannah Fox in person
  • Seeing our diabetes community represented so well in sessions like Dana's (and Scott's) #DIYPS and Doug's Databetes project
  • How truly valuable the ePatient Advisory Board was to the ePatient delegates/scholars, and how generous they were with their time, their hearts, and their energy (to the point that I'm concerned that they all need a week-long debrief/spa vacation/nap to recover properly)
The common denominator that made this year's MedX so great? People. Their stories. The way "diabetes patient" and "arthritis patient" and "crohn's patient" all just became "patients" in one community. The way patients and physicians and students alike voiced their concerns, thoughts, questions, and visions. I saw so much respect; so much curiosity; so much drive.

I'm still processing it all, but this Just Talking podcast does a great job of capturing some ePatients' thoughts on the conference in a more crowdsourced kind of way.