Having a breather

Events rather ran away with us last week - after those horrible nights of R being low for hours and hours we decided on Friday to see our GP. I'd been up with R from midnight to 6am, P had done the earlier shift until midnight, R hadn't slept at all and his blood hadn't risen above 5 despite all the glucose we'd been getting him to eat. The GP sent us to the local Children's Assessment Unit where we saw our old consultant - we sat with her and discussed the problem of his hypos and how we wanted things to move forward for about two hours. Finally with some brilliant advice from other parents of Children With Diabetes we insisted she contact UCLH - the hospital where R has been referred to for his diabetes care because we weren't satisfied with the care and support we'd received from our local team. The consultant did this but because it was Friday over the weekend there would be no more particular expertise than if we went to our local hospital and were transferred during the follow week. As we were all so tired this was our best option, so since Friday R has been in the local children's ward. I stayed two nights and his father stayed with him for two nights and one way or another he's never been left alone while there - my big fear was that well meaning medical staff who were largely ignorant of current diabetes practise might insist on a treatment that could well cause further problems.
We were lucky though - the nursing staff were brilliant and couldn't do enough for both R and I - even when he had a hypo yesterday afternoon and we had to chase him around the ward and then bribe him with money to take some Glucogel! Likewise, most of the doctors we met, once they'd heard what R has been going through they accepted that specialist knowledge was required and supported us as much as they could - one doctor spent hours over the weekend trying to contact various Endocrinologists up at UCLH so he could get some advice.
Only once, this morning actually, did we come across a doctor whose ideas about managing Type 1 Diabetes in children and adolescents were out of date and restrictive. Her plan - based upon reading his notes, not having talked to him or ever seen him before - was that carbohydrate counting and injecting insulin based upon what R was going to eat was useless for him as he couldn't manage it. Instead he ought to have three fixed doses of insulin each day and a restrictive diet.
Okay....why isn't that any good?
Firstly three fixed doses a day - that's an insulin mix which was the way all Type 1 diabetics were treated in the past. For some people it works extremely well but for most it's far from ideal. It requires a fixed diet - the same amount of carbohydrate each day, snacks at the same day and ideally the same level of activity each day. For many adults this can be ideal - only three injections and their diabetes is managed without it being intrusive to their lives. Unfortunately if you add growth hormone into the mix - which all children produce in large quantities, then put in P.E. lessons a couple of times a week, rugby practise and matches, weekends lazing around playing PS3 games and normal life for children. The fixed diet and fixed activity levels don't sound so good anymore.
Oh, and don't forget, some of those mixes are now so old-fashioned that the pharmaceutical companies are phasing them out in favour of modern treatments.
Secondly - carb counting too hard? No. There are plenty of books out there to help you count how many carbs are in a meal and there's even a brilliant iPhone/iPod app called Carbs and Cals - we use it almost every day. Once you've decided how many carbs are in your meal you work out how many units of insulin you need to inject to cover it depending on what ratio you use for that meal. Okay, I admit it, this bit can be complex....there is a wonderful blog post all about how complex this really is for Type 1 diabetics - do read it and maybe get an idea of how we live our lives now. Yes, it's complex but so is using an iPhone or playing a PS3 game if you've never done it before. Since diagnosis seven months ago, R's mental arithmetic abilities have gone from good to excellent. Just because something is complex it doesn't mean you shouldn't do it.
The third reason for not wanting to use insulin mixes is because we believe that for R's continued and future good health the best way forward is to keep up with new treatments, new technology and what the very best Diabetologists and Endocrinologists are suggesting. So what is it?

Insulin Pump Therapy
So that's another reason for going to UCLH - they're the best, nearest and they're the centre for pumps in the South East.

This morning R was finally discharged from our local hospital, he's home and is now catching up on lost hours of playing Call of Duty on the PS3. Tomorrow we're all off to London - he's being admitted to UCLH for the rest of the week at least and hopefully they can help us to manage diabetes more effectively.
I have mixed feelings about all of this - on the one hand I'm so pleased that finally we'll be seeing doctors who really understand this horrible condition and on the other hand I'm exhausted with fighting both diabetes and ignorance.