What Diabetes Supplies Do I Take With Me When I Leave The House?

By Elisabeth Almekinder RN, BA, CDE 1 Comment
You may be wondering what you should take with you when you leave the house when you have diabetes. After all, you want to be prepared for anything, and have everything that you might need for your diabetes in case of an emergency. In this article, we will look at what you should take with you when you leave home for several hours, or for a few nights sleepover somewhere.
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Some people with Type 2 Diabetes , who managed it with diet and exercise alone, may not have anything to take with them. They may need to plan for healthy meals, and regular physical activity while they are away.
If you have Pre-Diabetes , or Type 2 Diabetes, and you dont take medications or check your blood sugars, then its business as usual for the most part.
For others with Type 2 Diabetes who must take a pill and check their blood sugars regularly, they will have more to pack. Those with Type 1 Diabetes or Type 2 Diabetes who take insulin will have even more to pack, and those with Type 1 or Type 2 Diabetes who have an insulin pump , and a Continuous Glucose Monitor (CGM) will have the most preparation to do to make sure that they have everything they need when they go off on a short trip.
It could be just leaving the house for a few hours, or going somewhere for a few days. Either way, those with Type 1 Continue reading

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Relationships, intimacy, and sexwithdiabetes

Relationships, intimacy, and sexwithdiabetes
A couple months ago, I was contacted by someone from Diabetes Forecast magazine , part of the American Diabetes Association, asking if I would be willing to answer a few questions about dating, relationships, intimacy, and sex with diabetes for an upcoming article. I gave this request a lot of consideration, since these are sensitive topics that I have tended to steer away from on my blog. Ultimately, these are important, real life issues that people with diabetes wonder about, but are rarely talked about. I decided that I have a perspective that is worth sharing and I hope that it will help others who may have questions or concerns related to these topics.
The article Sex and Diabetes in Diabetes Forecast does a really good job of talking to a diverse group of people with both type 1 and type 2 diabetes, and sharing their varied experiences. It combines their stories with important and relevant information from medical professionals. I highly recommend you read it. I have 2 quotes in the article, which were part of a much longer interview. I have decided to post the full interview below.
How and when do you reveal that you have diabetes to a partner or potential partner?
My diabetes is a big part of my life, and its important that Im with someone who is understanding and supportive. If theyre not, Id want to know upfront before things get too serious. I usually tell someone I have diabetes on the first or second date. Ive always found ways to naturally bring it up in conversation. For example, when discussing hobbies or Continue reading

S.M.A.R.T. goals for diabetes management

set goals SMART (specific, measurable, attainable, recorded, timely) colorful sticky notes on cork bulletin board
Self-managing diabetes, whether type 1, type 2 or gestational diabetes, can be very challenging and empowering at the same time. Just remember - change does take time. To be patient with change is very important.
S.M.A.R.T. goals for diabetes management is a tool that has helped people with diabetes experience life-changing improvements. It is a tool that assists individuals break down a goal into smaller specific goals. These smaller goals can be worked on more easily than working on the larger goal, which may be viewed as overwhelming and therefore unreachable.
Small steps set smaller, easy, specific goals, such as taking medication every day. When you are setting up this goal ask yourself the 6 W questions:
Always talk to your health care professional if you have questions about your treatment plan.
Who: Who is involved? My endo team, my husband
What: What do I want to accomplish? For my diabetes to be better controlled: by taking my medication everyday
Where: Identify where you can give yourself your medication
When: Establish a time when medication is to be taken
Which: Identify requirements and constraints, such as where at work can I give myself my insulin that will be a safe place for me?
Why: Specific reasons, purpose or benefits of accomplishing the goal. By taking my medication daily my A1C should improve, I should feel better.
Check feelings. What do you feel about your goal? This is an important question. The way you feel about your go Continue reading

Screening for type 2 diabetes: do screen-detected cases fare better?

, Volume 60, Issue11 , pp 22002209 | Cite as
Screening for type 2 diabetes: do screen-detected cases fare better?
We aimed to investigate whether diabetes cases detected through screening have better health outcomes than clinically detected cases in a population-based cohort of adults who were eligible to be screened for diabetes at 10year intervals.
The Vsterbotten Intervention Programme is a community- and individual-based public health programme in Vsterbotten County, Sweden. Residents are invited to clinical examinations that include screening for diabetes by OGTTs at age 30, 40, 50 and 60years (individuals eligible for screening, n=142,037). Between 1992 and 2013, we identified 1024 screen-detected cases and 8642 clinically detected cases of diabetes using registry data. Clinically detected individuals were either prior screening participants (n=4506) or people who did not participate in screening (non-participants, n=4136). Study individuals with diabetes were followed from date of detection until end of follow-up, emigration, death or incident cardiovascular disease (CVD), renal disease or retinopathy event, and compared using Cox proportional hazard regression adjusted for calendar time, age at detection, year of detection, sex and socioeconomic status.
The average age at diabetes diagnosis was 4.6years lower for screen-detected individuals compared with clinically detected individuals. Overall, those who were clinically detected had worse health outcomes than those who were screen-detected (HR for all-cause mortality 2.07 [95% CI 1.63, 2.62]). Compared with s Continue reading

The effect of insulin on bone mineral density among women with type 2 diabetes: a SWAN Pharmacoepidemiology study

Abstract
This was a longitudinal study examining the effects of insulin use on bone mineral density loss. Insulin use was found to be associated with greater bone mineral density loss at the femoral neck among women with diabetes mellitus.
Women with diabetes mellitus (DM) have higher bone mineral density (BMD) and experience slower BMD loss but have an increased risk of fracture. The data regarding the effect of insulin treatment on BMD remains conflicted. We examined the impact of insulin initiation on BMD.
We investigated the annual changes in BMD associated with the new use of insulin among women with DM in the Study of Women’s Health Across the Nation (SWAN). Propensity score (PS) matching, which is a statistical method that helps balance the baseline characteristics of women who did and did not initiate insulin, was used. Covariates with a potential impact on bone health were included in all models. Mixed model regression was used to test the change in BMD between the two groups. Median follow-up time was 5.4 years.
The cohort consisted of 110 women, mean age, 53.6 years; 49% white and 51% black. Women using insulin (n = 55) were similar on most relevant characteristics to the 55 not using insulin. Median diabetes duration for the user group was 10 vs. 5.0 years for the non-user group. There was a greater loss of BMD at the femoral neck among insulin users (− 1.1%) vs non-users (− 0.77%) (p = 0.04). There were no differences in BMD loss at the spine − 0.30% vs − 0.32% (p = 0.85) or at the total hip − 0.31% vs − 0.25 (p = 0.71), respectively.
Women with T Continue reading