Starting Insulin Therapy

Featuring Lori Berard, RN, CDE, Diabetes Educator

Duration: 1 minute, 36 seconds

First of all, needing insulin to manage your type 2 diabetes is not a failure. Think of using insulin as topping up the tank. When you have type 2 diabetes, one of the things that happens in your body is you don’t make enough insulin. So at some point in your journey with diabetes, you might need to top up the tank of your own insulin to be able to properly control your blood sugars.

When the decision is made to start you on insulin, typically you’ll see that you’ll be prescribed one shot of basal insulin at whatever time of day works for you. Your healthcare team will work with you to help you understand when to take your insulin, how to take your insulin and when to monitor your blood sugars.

It’s important to remember that the dose that you’re started on is not the dose that’s going to control your blood sugars. Everyone’s diabetes is different, what’s really important is you work with your healthcare team to increase your insulin dose to find the dose that’s right for you, to reach your target blood sugars.

Starting insulin can be very scary. Not to worry, we have lots of tools to help support you along the journey. Things like electronic uploads, meters that help you calculate your dose. We can help you through this. What you need to do is make sure that you think of the questions that you have and contact your diabetes support team.

Starting insulin is not a failure. Think of it as topping up the tank. What’s important is that we achieve target blood sugar control for you to prevent complications. For more information, talk to your diabetes healthcare team.

Presenter: Lori Berard, Nurse, Winnipeg, MB

Local Practitioners: Nurse