Oh…and my Carb ratio is set at 5.6g/U if that helps or maybe needs to be tweaked.
First I would say learn as much as you can about your personal needs. We can all be so different and then it can change tomorrow. It is beneficial to learn how to change settings.
At 3 units per hour you are using 72 units per day for basal only. And if you are adding to that, you are using even more. That means a pod at 200 total units might not work for you to do both bolus and basal through it.
You might need to switch insulins? Maybe this one isn’t working well for you? That happens. Or if you want to use a pod, you could switch to U 200 Humalog which is a concentrate, if you use it in the pod, the pod can actually hold 400 units which might at least cover 2 days. If you do switch to U 200 it is trickier until you get used to it to do the programming.The only other way is to take either a bolus or a basal dose through it but it doesn’t look like you will have enough insulin in a pod to do both with your current insulin.
A basal test would probably be a good idea.
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3 Units per hour is quite a lot, are you sure your sets are delivering the insulin effectively? You could certainly need that much, but as Marie mentioned a basal test sounds like it is in order. Once you nail down your basal, then we can give you advise on the next test. For my son, when his basal is set correctly, everything else is easier. Honestly we have never tried to optimize the active insulin time. Once we set the basal and the correction factor, things work swimmingly well.
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I’ll check into basal testing. I have to change the site out tonight at some point. Waiting on my pump to run out of insulin. It gave me the 20 unit warning at dinner…and I’m chasing a high right now. I over bolused for dinner…and over corrected…I’m still learning. And a learning curve for this SUCKS!
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Basically you are looking to skip a meal two or three times. Each time, pick a different time of day, i.e. skip breakfast one day, then lunch the next. When you skip that meal you are trying to get your basal dialed in, you should aim for a minimal change over the three hour window. It goes without saying that you have to be stable before you start so this could take a week or more to find the windows that work. Once you dial in the basal you will find everything else is easier. We do a basal test twice a year, or whenever his control gets wonky for a couple of weeks.
Yes, this disease is a challenge, we agree, we commiserate, and ultimately that is why we started this site. To support each other when the medical professionals don’t have time to get in depth as much as many of us would like.
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@Marie Thank you for this link. I will probably start testing tomorrow. I have nothing better to do since my Dr. has me off work until June 10th. So, plenty of time to play with my blood sugar and run some tests of my own! I also just bought the book Sugar Surfing by Stephen Ponder, so I’ll be reading that while I’m off too. Looks like lots of note taking is in order for me!! Yayyyy!
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You should see my son, he can go from 50-200 on 8 carbs, so he often gives himself insulin right after eating 8 carbs when he is 50. Crazy stuff. But it is what he has found works for him, so we keep supporting him. Also, if you find things really hard, eating around 100 carbs a day has worked really well for my son.
Edit - Oh, and if you find that your basal is too much for your pump, you can do what my son does, and inject a basal every night like lantus to provide 50% of your basal and use the pump for the other half. This also helps when your pump sites go down keeping you in a better range, and for my son helps because he exercises frequently so stopping his pump basal allows his injected basal to be just about right most of the time.
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Long time Omnipod user coming from a Medtronic 630 pump and absolutely LOVE it. Insulet has excellent support, and if you have to pay for your insulin, let them know and they will reimburse for any insulin left in the pod. Who does that? NO ONE that I know!
I also agree with the pump change bolus. Definitely do this.
What I do insulin wise is keep one in the box of 10 and when it gets low, I take another one out of the fridge. That way it is always room temp. Doesn’t matter as much in pumps as it does for injections though.
If you find that the 200 units in the pod is to little for you, have your doc prescribe more pods than one every 3 days and you can also have your doc prescribe pens as backup. I use my pens for bolus when convenient to make the pods last longer.
Definitely ask questions. There are a lot of podders here and on tudiabetes.org as well.
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@bpollina Thank you! I am currently set up for 150u/day for my U100 in my Medtronic 630G. My Dr. has ordered pod changes every 2 days (so far). I’m going to have to do Basal Testing to figure out what is right for me…as I REALLY think it’s WAYYYY off! Maybe my trainer with Omnipod will do a better job for me than my trainer with Medtronic when we do the set up next week. But, I figure since I’m off work for the next several days, I have time to mess with it (mess it up is probably more like it) and do more research on my own blood sugars and how I react to stuff. My A1C for June won’t be good…by September I want it to be dialed in as close as possible. Right now, based on the Clarity report My average BG is 166 mg/dL with a standard deviation of 47mg/dL and a GMI of 7.3%. I’ve only been in range 68% of the time (and that’s with the it set to 70 - 180 - 180 is too high for what I want and I don’t know how to change that setting). The other 32% of the time I run high. Thankfully no lows, but while I’m working on my tweaking I’m sure they’re going to happen.
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@egreen76 Unless it’s different where you live. The doctor gives the rep his recommended settings for everything programmable on the pump and that is probably based on what the doctor knows you are at already? They just show you how and maybe why?
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@Marie - My PCP is who is following me with the pump. I’m their only “Pumper” because I insisted we could manage this without me having to drive into Nashville to see an Endo. My experience with the last Endo was not good at all and I LOVE my PCP because they LISTEN to me and allow me to take part in my treatment for everything else.
As far as the recommended settings for everything programmable on the pump - it’s about to be handled as I’m currently (as I type this) am in the midst of typing out a message to my PCP through their portal. She’ll know what I’m up to and why! 
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