Diabetes: What Type Of Insulin Is Right For Me?

Rapid onset-fast acting insulin

Rapid onset-fast acting insulin always looks clear. It is fast acting and starts to work within one to 20 minutes. It peaks about one hour later and lasts from three to five hours. When you use this type of insulin, you must eat immediately after you inject.

The two rapid onset-fast acting insulin types currently available are:

1. NovoRapid (Insulin Aspart)
2. Humalog (Lispro).


Rapid onset-fast acting insulin always looks clear. It is fast acting and starts to work within one to 20 minutes. It peaks about one hour later and lasts from three to five hours. When you use this type of insulin, you must eat immediately after you inject.

The two rapid onset-fast acting insulin types currently available are:

1. NovoRapid (Insulin Aspart)
2. Humalog (Lispro).

Short-acting insulin

Short-acting insulins always look clear. They begin to lower blood glucose levels within half an hour, so you need to have your injection half an hour before eating.

Short-acting insulin has a peak effect at two to four hours and lasts for between six and eight hours. Short-acting insulin types currently available include:

1. Actrapid
2. Humulin
3. Hypurin Neutral (bovine - highly purified beef insulin).

Intermediate-acting insulin

Intermediate-acting insulins always look cloudy. They have either protamine or zinc added to delay their action. These insulins begin to work about 90 minutes after you inject, peak at four to 12 hours, and last for 16 to 24 hours.

Intermediate-acting insulins currently available include:

1. With protamine added – Protaphane, Humulin NPH and Hypurin Isophane (bovine).

Preventing Diabetes

You'll need to keep an eye on your blood sugar levels and take treatment for your diabetes for the rest of your life. If you don't have good control of your blood sugar you'll be at risk from damage to the blood vessels and nerves, with problems such as deterioration in eyesight, stroke, kidney disease and infections.

As your doctor has already explained, careful diet and pills are all that is needed in most cases. If you're overweight, simply eating less and losing weight can be enough to allow the insulin to work more effectively.

Why Use Insulin Pumps?

The number of people using insulin pump therapy to manage their diabetes is growing rapidly; roughly 250,000 people around the world use an insulin pump. Their reasons for choosing the pump are many, but generally "pumpers" all agree that it gives them tighter control and more flexibility -- both in terms of their schedule and lifestyle. This control and flexibility include advantages such as:

1. Eating what you want, when you want
2. Worrying less about low blood sugars ("hypoglycemia")
3. Living life on your terms, not a schedule of snacks and shots

There are many scientific studies that demonstrate that insulin pump therapy results in better outcomes for teens and adults with type 1 diabetes. There are also studies that show that insulin pump therapy works well in toddlers and pre-school children.

Trends are changing

Before, when you are diagnosed with diabetes, it is synonymous to loss of limbs, total loss of vision or blindness, kidney failure, and worst, early death. But now, this is no longer the case. Because of the trends in modern technology and advances in the medical field through research, many people with diabetes are seeing hope that they will enjoy longer and healthier their lives just like the regular people.

1. Insulin. Since diabetes is caused by lack of supply of insulin among diabetics, more and more people come up with variations with the way insulin can enter the body such as:

- implantable insulin pumps which makes it possible for the blood sugar levels to be measured so the and exact amount of insulin needed is delivered instantly;

- insulin inhalers which can aid the daily injections of insulin by providing instant relief by using rapid-acting insulin which is sprayed and inhaled through the mouth—including its coats, the throat and the tongue to pave the way for insulin to enter the into the bloodstream quickly;

- insulin pill which will use a new type of polymer can help the diabetic get insulin faster because it can allow insulin to get into the person's bloodstream without being destroyed by the digestive system; and

- new insulins which are designed to minimize the regimens and to better control glucose for people including "glargine" which is a basal insulin, the "aspart" which is a very-rapid-acting insulin, and the "75/25 lispro mixture" containing a very-rapid-acting content.

2. Monitoring and tests. These are very important to know how well the diabetic is doing. The new trends when it comes to monitoring and tests include:

- pain free glucose tests which allows the diabetic to monitor their own blood sugar without the excruciating pain of literally sticking their fingers to be able to get blood samples;

- continuous monitoring device which is a "wristwatch-like" device that give more information in how to mange diabetes effectively;

3. New treatments. Since diabetes is a chronic disease, there's no definite treatment to cure it. However, there are more and more treatments that promise better results like:

- islet cell transplant which can be effective for people with the rare type of diabetes—the type 1 diabetes—because it uses the Edmonton technique which utilize uses cells from the pancreas or islet cells coming from a donor to help the person to produce insulin;

- gene therapy which identifies that a gene called "SHIP2" can regulate the production of insulin;

4. Vaccine. Through the vaccine—containing a peptide—that stops the destruction of pancreatic cells in the human body, more and more diabetics are now hoping that they can live longer lives despite the illness.

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