Actions to Reduce the Risk of Severe Lows

00:00 – 00:39 Speaker 1: If I was to consider the most important things that an individual with diabetes should be aware of and should know in order to prevent them experiencing hypoglycemia. Ideally, it would be these: 1. Know the situations when you’re likely, or you have an increased risk of going low. 2. Wear a (medical) I.D.. 3. Know the early symptoms for you. And I reason I say for you is because symptoms are often very individual to that person.

00:40 – 01:13 Speaker 1: Take action early. And 4. Share it with as many people as you can in your immediate social circle, be they family or friends, if at all possible and you feel this is something that you can do. Those I think are the most important things that we should be making sure everybody with insulin as I said, whether they have Type 1 or Type 2 Diabetes should be told. For those people who live around them,

01:13 – 01:54 Speaker 1: I think we need to teach them possibly about the early symptoms. But most important of all, I think is to say that they have a responsibility that if they begin to notice that their partner, friend, child is behaving differently, they should be alert and they should ask the question. I wonder if they could be hypoglycemic. And in fact, we published a research study which showed that people with relatively longstanding Type 1 diabetes, when you ask the question who recognizes hypoglycemia first?

01:54 – 02:18 Speaker 1: And you might think it would be the patient. In the majority of cases, it was the other person, the family member who noticed and and the conversation would go: “I think you might be low. Oh, no, I’m definitely not low. I feel fine. I think you should definitely check. No, I’m really OK”. And then finally they were persuaded to check they do that glucose.

02:18 – 02:31 Speaker 1:“Oh, my goodness. It’s much lower than I thought. So, so because that is so common, it’s very important that they should be aware of that and they can prevent a severe event.

02:31 – 02:55 Speaker 2: I think the most important way to prevent severe hypoglycemia is to talk about it and make a plan. So, you know, pretending that this will never happen, even if you’re really, really good with your medication and your diet is probably not realistic considering how common we know severe hypoglycemia is. So I think it’s important to prepare for the worst and say, “OK, what would happen in worst case scenario?

02:55 – 03:25 Speaker 2: What would happen in a best case scenario?” Where are you going to keep the product that can help get you through an episode of severe hypoglycemia, like glucagon in your house? Who do you live with? Who can we educate in your household to help you if you need help? Who are you close with at work that you can talk to about helping you? And I think sometimes patients feel hesitant or embarrassed to bring friends and family into the plan because they don’t want to burden people,

03:26 – 03:35 Speaker 2: but the real burden would be if they were totally unprepared to take care of their friends and loved ones, not if they were well-educated and had a good plan.

03:36 – 03:58 Speaker 3: And I always tell people having something kind of it’s like a unit of food or whatever that, you know, if you drink it or eat it, you know, raise your blood sugar and you can kind of relax. So I keep the apple juice by my bed. I know my blood sugar is low. I drink the whole thing, and I’m going to be good because anybody that’s ever had a low blood sugar would tell you that your desire to eat is just crazy.

03:59 – 04:12 Speaker 3: And if you get out of bed, you’ll eat everything in the fridge and your blood sugars will be 400. So having something with you that is a unit of kind of carbohydrate, you usually talk about 15 grams that’ll raise your blood sugar and put that stuff everywhere.