Bill - Not Happy With Insulin Pumps

by William Hammonds
(Augusta, Georgia)

I have serious problems with the OmniPod pump. My experience is different than the problems listed above at this web page. Those are minor problems that are not more that an annoyance.

My number one problem with the pump is that there is NO alarm when the pump malfunctions and insulin is not being delivered. Here is my story and how the pump failed and caused a serious threat to my life. I have had diabetes for 42 years. I have followed the development of the insulin pump, but would not use one because of the inconvenience of having the pump attached to my belt and the tubes conected to the canula under the skin. When I saw the Omnipod I thought, "this is it, a pump that is practical." I used the pump with only minor problems for nearly a year. Then one day without warning the pump stopped working. There was no alarm or other warning to alert me to the fact that the pump was not delivering insulin. I noticed that my blood glucose was high and took a bolus, and then another, and another. By this time my blood glucose was too high to measure and I was at work with no other source of insulin. After all, who carries around a bottle of insulin if you depend on a pump? The pump had never failed before. I had to leave work and drive home to get insulin. By this time I was in diabetic keto acidosis. I was too sick to return to work and missed half a day's work for just the second time in my life. I usually take between 25 and 30 units of insulin per day, but this day I took 10 units every hour until my blood glucose came down. It took seven hours and 70 additional units of insulin before I returned to normal blood glucose levels. I was very sick that day and felt terrible the next. It took about three days before I returned to normal.

I was ready to pass that off as just an unfortunate fluke, when it happened AGAIN. This time I was not so trusting of the pump so I left work at the first signs and drove home to get my insulin. This time because my level of suspicion was high, my blood glucose only went to 400 mg/dcl.

I called the company and complained. The people who talked to me were the model of what a concerned employee should be, but the fact remains that I had two failures in one week. One was as bad as any problem I have ever had in 42 years with diabetes.

I questioned them closely about some change in how the pumps were manufactured and about their quality control. They denied that anything had changed. I do not believe that their assertions are true.

My advise about the pump is don't use it! There is a fatal error in its design. That being, there is no alarm when the insulin stops being infused. Stick with inject-able insulin, you know that you have had your insulin when you inject it yourself. Diabetic ketoacidosis is a serious problem. I predict that someone will die from the fatal design flaw and that death will be attributable to a pump that silently stops delivering insulin.