Alternatives to Bad Reactions to Insulin?
by Sylvia
(Canada)
Insulin reaction
QUESTION: What else can you take if you are getting bad reactions to insulin?
ANSWER: Hi Sylvia,
To clearly answer your question, I need to have some more details as following:
You are telling that the person who is taking insulin has had bad reactions to it.
Now, what type of diabetes this patient has? This is quite important, because type 1 diabetics urge insulin. No other medication has been discovered for them yet.
If the patient is type 2 diabetic, then, there are many other alternatives to insulin. There are the oral hypoglycemiants, or other injecting drugs like GLP-1 analogues (liraglutide-Victoza: or DPP4 inhibitors (sitagliptin, vidagliptin, etc.)
Next, what kind of reactions are these? Are they of hypersensibility type? This type usually appears on the very first shots of insulin, and need medical attention because they might lead to death.
If this is the case, I need to know for how long the patient has been on insulin shots?
Or, are they related to droppings of blood sugar level? This is a common symptom related to all sugar lowering drugs.
If this is the case, you can ask your doctor to adjust the dose of insulin according to the patient's needs.
For this, the patient needs to record his/her blood sugar levels anytime he/she feels is having the hypoglycemia or hyperglicemia symptoms. Then, can pass these records to the doctor for further dose adjustments.
Are the bad reactions related to damages or other problems to the site where the shots are done? Then, you can discuss with your doctor for alternative sites where you can do the shots.
Remember not to inject the insulin into the muscle tissue to avoid damages and better absorption, but always perform injection into the fatty tissue.
You can also talk to your doctor for further assistance in handling the subcutaneous damages like infection, necrosis or whatever you see.
I feel sorry in not giving you an exact answer; but I need to have the above information for that. Your doctor is working close to you and knows better your medical history and can give a more precise answer.
Hope it helped!
Dr.Alba