The Benefits of Insulin Pump Therapy for Type 2 Diabetes
Diabetes is a devastating disorder, one that impacts tens of millions of people throughout the world and puts them at significant risk for a variety of medical complications and early death.
Thankfully, science has evolved a variety of tools and treatments that can help people with diabetes better manage their illness. One such example is a diabetes insulin pump.
About Insulin Pump Therapy
A diabetes insulin pump is essentially a small computer that sits clipped to your belt. It is attached to a small, thin needle that is inserted into your stomach.
The needle will constantly take readings of your blood sugar levels and will adjust the amount of insulin you get accordingly.
The entire process is automated – you just need to make sure the pump remains working and that it is loaded with insulin. It isn’t quite “set it and forget it,” as regular maintenance and monitoring is required.
However, it can make the life of a diabetic much easier by altering the amount of blood sugar they need to take on a regular basis.
Benefits of Insulin Pump Therapy
There are, unquestionably, a variety of benefits when it comes to insulin pump therapy. These include:
- Needle sticks become a thing of the past, as your blood sugar and insulin levels will be constantly and automatically updated by the pump.
- You will no longer need to manually calculate your sugar levels or determine how much insulin you need to take in order to keep your blood sugar levels stable.
- Because the process becomes so largely automated, you will dramatically limit the number of times in which your blood sugar dips to dangerous lows. Indeed, people who have an insulin pump report that their diabetes becomes much easier to manage as a result of the pump. This includes managing the “dawn phenomenon” in which many people have high sugar levels in the morning.
- Since the pump is hooked directly into your bloodstream, you will find that its accuracy is much greater than that of finger sticks. This helps keep your insulin levels more regular and in line with what your body needs.
- Exercise, and planning for exercise, are a breeze, and you can temporarily remove the pump in order to exercise appropriately.
- The pump works 24 hours a day, even while you sleep. This ensures that your blood sugar levels can be protected at all times, working just like your pancreas would be working if it functioned normally.
All of this can help keep you safer from diabetes, thus potentially reducing the instances of very serious diabetes complications, including heart, kidney, eye, and nerve problems.
Under the right set of circumstances, insulin pump therapy can be exceptionally helpful for people who suffer from diabetes. If this is something that you are interested in pursuing, you should speak with your doctor as soon as possible and see if a diabetes pump is right for you.