Actos (pioglitazone)?

Has anyone taken Actos? I contacted my doctor about my slightly increased insulin needs and higher fasting levels, asking if perhaps I could start a very small basal dose. She instead suggested I try Actos and see how I do with that. I looked it up, then expressed concerns about possible side effects. She responded that her patients with LADA have had good success with it. I was about to leave on vacation, so I’m only now getting back to looking at it. At this point, I’d rather just keep giving myself small doses/corrections of Novolog during periods where my levels are higher than take this med.

I took Actos for several years and ended up with colon cancer that was attributed to the Actos.

Are you currently taking no basal?

Yikes, I am so sorry! :worried:

@Eric, that’s correct, no basal. Recently, I began spending 3/4 of the month with fasting/in between meals hovering around 100-120, which I know isn’t terrible, but is very different from the 70-90s the other 1/4 of the month that was typical for me, and since my goal range tops out at 140, it doesn’t leave much room for post prandial rises at times, thus I have to add correctional doses to my meal boluses often during this time. My ratios have increased slightly also, though I’ve also been more aggressive with dosing and correcting, so I’m not sure how much really changed physiologically and how much was just me getting more comfortable dosing more. Ideally, I’d like to have basal on hand so that when I see a couple days of higher numbers beginning, I can dose even just a couple units to keep things “normal” until my numbers go back down (I know it’s more complicated than this description and I will have to be careful of lows). To me, that’s no different than someone increasing their basal dose for a time due to illness, hormones, steroids, etc, etc - if your body needs more insulin, it needs more insulin. My doctor doesn’t see it that way, at least through what we’ve discussed via messaging. I’m working on getting in for a face to face appointment so I can better communicate and see if that changes her opinion or not.

Sorry, that was much more than a yes/no answer and probably more than you wanted to hear. :slightly_smiling_face:

Hearing your doctor’s recommendation is frustrating to me.

If you have higher fasting numbers, you could try using what every single non-diabetic on the planet uses - basal insulin. Insulin is used by everyone, diabetic or not!

I don’t understand the fear doctors have of insulin, particularly for someone like you who already uses bolus insulin for meals. Insulin is a much more natural thing than something like Actos, which alters what your liver is doing.

I don’t know why doctors want to mess with the body and introduce things like this.

If someone had significant insulin resistance or whatever, and they had tried other things and were not successful, then sure, try something like this. But if you haven’t been taking basal yet, why in the world would they start with something like this?

Take a look at the warnings:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmedhealth/PMHT0011742/?report=details#warning

You could start on a very low dose of Tresiba and see how that works.

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Yes, in many ways it is as simple as that. If you see that your body needs more insulin, then take it. Basal seems to me to be a quite reasonable solution to what you describe. But wanting to have fasting BG 70-90 and never spike over 140 seems to me to be much more stringent than needed for good health, so I’d suggest not to go to extremes to achieve that. Be kind to yourself: gentle persuasion, not floggings.

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It’s frustrating to me, too. Of course, it took a lot for her to prescribe bolus insulin at first (until I did a CGM trial after my pregnancy that showed obvious need for it). Before that, I’d relied on the maternal fetal medicine specialist to prescribe bolus/basal insulin’s for me.

My goal right now is fasting <100 and post prandial <140, but that’s just something to shoot for when deciding what to dose for a meal; I’ve become very good at shrugging off numbers higher than that (correct and move on!), except for this consistent need for intervention that’s not being addressed properly. :slightly_smiling_face: