I remember, I believe it was @Eric or possibly @Chris, many months ago when we were talking about how folks store their Insulin vials, that one of you guys (sorry if it was someone else, but I somehow feel it was one of those two guys) keep your vials in plastic pencil cases and you had a system for labeling them with colored dots…but I can’t for the life of me find that post.
Whoever it was, could you please refer me to that post again if you can find it? For the past 2 years, I’ve not really had any system for storing the vials…they honestly get purchased from CVS in the brown paper bags and I have just been keeping them in those bags and removing vials from them when I needed to get a vial (taking from the oldest bag first, of course).
But now, we’ve got FOUR BAGS worth of supplies in the fridge and it’s becoming unruly so I’ve purchased some pencil cases and I’m ready to “get organized”. I logged in to find the system whoever created that post used because I liked it a lot at the time - but now I can’t find it.
Glad you found value in the idea. It has worked really well for us, and we now always use the insulin in the order it will expire, and once the dots are applied, it only takes a second to make sure you are using vials in the right order.
On the organization side it is pretty cool how many vials fit in one pencil case.
I plan on using that same dot notation system for my boxes of PODS. We have nearly 1.5 years worth of POD boxes (17 boxes) in the closet and when we fill a new order I am having to pull out all the boxes and re-order them to ensure I’m putting them in FIFO order. This way, I can just mark them and put up a little legend on the wall to see which “dot” I should be using…this will allow me to put them in the closet in any order and just follow this same dot notation for which to pull out and use. It’ll be much less work. Thanks for the great idea!
Here are my pencil boxes. They are grouped by type and date. I generally try to keep the newer ones on the bottom so I can just take a vial from the top.
What is the pink padding at the top? Some form of foam or styrofoam padding? I see the bubble wrap on the one to on the bottom left. Good idea to have some type of padding especially if there’s space at the top.
I like that storage approach. We have a very very small stash. (You would laugh.) But they are all still in the original boxes the vials come in - so they take up more space. I guess there really is no reason to keep the box. I think I will copy this - it really looks very well organized and efficient on space usage.
My mom is staying in the apartment behind our place, complete with the fridge with EH’s spare insulin. It’s all in the boxes from the pharmacy — and it takes up most of the door. The other day she asked me “do you think he’s going use all of that?” And I enjoyed a enumerating all of the ways that we might need it (job/insurance loss, disaster, zombie apocalypse). She clarified that she just wanted to know if it ever expired ( I explained that it does, but that expired insulin actually still works.)
I did realize that I feel a lot better having a stash available of various insulins, than I ever did before when we only filled an RX if we needed it. It sure makes things easier when the month doesn’t go as planned.
For instance, the Humalog wasn’t really working the other night in the Omnipod. So I got a bottle of NovoLog out and it finally brought down Eric’s BG. (I’m working on a post about that issue…) Anyhow, it was really nice to just have it in the fridge. I certainly appreciate seeing the storage solutions and stash suggestions here on FUD! Very inspirational!
Yes, Humalog only. We discussed with CDE in December if Novolog would be better, but since we were getting on a plane and leaving for Russia we decided to stick with Humalog. She claimed no one had ever said they’d noticed a difference. I’m just getting back into the swing of things at home so now it’s time to switch. Endocrinologist appointment Tuesday so new RX for Novolog.
The only thing I notice is a lot less 3rd day drop-offs with NovoLog. That’s the only difference for me.
If she says she has not heard anyone has ever noticed a difference, we should try to see if we can get her better internet access. Accounts of differences are pretty easy to find in the DOC.
When her dial-up AOL account expires, let’s sign her up for broadband.
We just saw her today so I told her what you all have reported!! And Eric made the switch. She’s happy to write a NovoLog RX for 100u a day (which is great because then it’s enough for the pump and no worries about failures or running out…)
Wow…that’s organization! and very space efficient storage of insulin. My family laughed at me and commented as to why I would need so much insulin…well, one never knows if insurance plans change, pre authorization…nonsense that could delay the filling of a prescription. I’m encountering that now for the freestyle light teststrips. I’m glad that I had some extra strips.
