For those of us on multiple daily injections (known as MDI), many of us know about varying our insulin doses around the food we’re taking. Matching food to doses is partly a science, but it’s also an art — it’s not just about the food, or even your dose, but it’s about you and how your body uses the energy it gets from food.
If you’re a carb-counter, then this new system has an on-board ‘advisor’ to help you gauge the correct insulin dose, complete with a great colour screen. Taking this further, many diabetics on insulin are on two forms of insulin — rapid acting and long acting. This system actually addresses your rapid-acting (or bolus) insulin.
Using this system could help you to optimise your diabetes control. Test your blood glucose with this system, enter your carbs and the system will give you advice on your dose (bolus). In this way you can have greater confidence in how to use your blood glucose results to achieve the kind of blood test results you want to see, and avoid hypos in the process.
This system has been in the UK and Ireland for about a year, and has received very positive feedback. It is not available in pharmacies due to the fact that it needs to be set up around your own individual needs, such as your insulin-to-carbohydrate ratios. This is best done at first with an expert to hand, so if you would like to know more about the Accu-Chek Aviva Expert bolus advisor, talk to your diabetes specialist nurse or click here for further information.
From now on, you could have an Expert in your pocket all day long!