I’ve lived with type 1 diabetes for the past 18 years and I travel by plane for business or pleasure (or both…) almost monthly. You probably think that by now I’d have traveling with diabetes down pat. But in true diabetes fashion, I’m constantly learning and re-learning D-management tweaks all the time — especially when on the go!
The Insulin Debacle
This past weekend, my husband and I traveled to Phoenix for a family wedding. It was the end of March and it was my second time packing a suitcase that month. Feeling confident and prepared to travel to the Southwest, we were off! While on the plane, my insulin pump alarmed that my reservoir (the drum that holds insulin) was low, and I’d need a refill soon. I checked and had enough basal to get by for a few more hours, so I decided to wait until lunch rather than dig through my carry-on suitcase.
When we arrived in Phoenix, we were starving, so we headed to a local Mexican restaurant with excellent reviews. Settled in with a full basket of chips just calling my name, now was the perfect time to fill up with insulin. But it was still in my suitcase.
“Hey honey, could you run to the car and grab my insulin and a reservoir?” I asked my husband as I took out my meter to test. Minutes later, he returned, handing me the reservoir with one hand while fishing out the bottle of Humalog with the other. Or at least, that’s what I thought he was doing.
Next thing I know, the bottle of insulin is rolling out of my husband’s hand and onto the table, and then rolling off the table and onto the tile floor of the restaurant, landing with a loud Crack!
Yikes! As I picked up the bottle, I could feel the cool liquid dripping down my hand. The bottle of insulin? Destroyed. Completely totaled. No chance of survival. A gash in the bottom of the bottle was now leaking dozens of units of precious insulin.
- Dead on arrival
;
Lesson Learned: I was actually good in this instance. Even though I haven’t broken a bottle of insulin in over 10 years, as a rule, I always bring two bottles of insulin (or more) when traveling. My husband retrieved the other bottle from the car (handled with care!) and I was all set for my crab enchiladas.
The Insulin Pump Debacle
The next day was the wedding. A bright, hot March afternoon, a lovely ceremony and a beautiful bride. We entered the ballroom and sat down for dinner. I tested my blood sugar while chatting with family, and my meter (an UltraLink) transmitted my reading (a respectable 184 mg/dl post-appetizers) to my Medtronic insulin pump. I wasn’t quite ready to bolus yet, so I just left things as is. Until I noticed a faint squeal coming from under my dress. You know, where I had my insulin pump clipped. Stuck between my Spanx and my skin sat my insulin pump, and it was not happy.
“Button Error,” it yelled. Oh no. Not here. I tried clearing the alarm, but to no avail, so I turned off the pump by taking out the battery. I did this twice. It didn’t work.
- Party crasher
;
“My insulin pump is broken,” I told my husband. Judging by the look on his face, I’m not sure he realized that was possible. “I have to call Medtronic.” I hurried outside. After a brief call with the Medtronic rep, an insulin pump was on its way. It would ship overnight, but it wouldn’t arrive until Monday morning (because obviously when pumps break, it will be on a Saturday night).
Since we were leaving the next day and I had a spare insulin pump at home, all I needed was a day’s worth of basal. I frantically called Mike Lawson, one of our cartoonists here at the ‘Mine, who lives in Phoenix and uses Lantus. I left him a voicemail and then sent out a half-dozen SOS messages on Facebook and Twitter. When my husband came outside to check on me, he gently reminded me that three of his family members at the wedding are doctors. I sure married into the right family! After a quick phone call to a pharmacy less than a mile away, I was set with a bottle of insulin and more syringes than I could possibly use.
Lessons Learned: A few. Namely: for crying out loud, bring a prescription for Lantus with you when you travel! Keeping your emergency prescription(s) in the medical folder of your filing cabinet is not helpful when your pump dies while on vacation. Or maybe that’s just me. Although I have not dealt with a pump failure in almost 7 years, they can happen without warning and are completely unpredictable. It’s always better to be prepared than scrambling during an important occasion to get what you need to survive.
The TSA Debacle
Our trip to Phoenix was short, and we were at the airport before noon the next day. Free of an insulin pump, I was thinking that for once in my life, security was going to be a piece of cake. The TSA officer motioned me through the regular metal detector, which I was actually disappointed about because this would have been the perfect time to go through the backscatter machine hassle-free! *Sigh* Thinking I was free and clear, I gathered my belongings. Then suddenly another TSA officer holds up my purse and says, “I need to examine this bag.” Assuming it was related to the pack of syringes, I paid no mind to this small delay.
She held up my Juicy Juice juice box. “This is 6.75 oz.”
Yes, yes it is.
“I’m a diabetic,” I explain.
“I need to test it,” the TSA officer says.
“But I’ve gone through security plenty of times with this,” I reply. And I have. Dozens of times. Never had an issue so far.
This doesn’t seem to faze the officer. “I need to open it to test it.” It’s a juice box. You can’t re-seal a juice box.
Blood boiling, I wave my hand. “Just keep it.” I stalk off, holding back tears from the injustice of it all and the aggravation diabetes has caused me this weekend. My husband attempts to console me, but I just need to cool down.
Lesson Learned: You mean other than confirming that the TSA sucks? *Sigh again* As Jeff Hitchcock pointed out when I vented on Facebook, juice boxes are totally legit in passing TSA security. But my protestations weren’t going very far with this woman. I could have argued with her more. I could have requested to see her supervisor. Or I could have brought that document from TSA explaining what diabetes supplies are approved to go through security without issue. Guess which one would have been easier? Yep — the darn piece of paper.
Moral of the Story
There is a never-ending list of ways diabetes complicates life, and issues in traveling are nothing new. I’ve been lucky to have made it this far without having many issues. I know many, many more people who have had much more painful encounters with TSA over insulin pumps and bottles of insulin, but the combination of all three within 48 hours was just too much.
With the summer travel season kicking into high gear soon, do you have any D-travel lessons that the rest of us could learn from?
My main lesson from this experience? While my vacation was still lovely, what I could really use now is a vacation from diabetes!
Medtronic is good at getting pumps to you when they break… I went swimming in the ocean with mine while pregnant in DE which does not have a public airport in the state. I had a new pump in hand with in 12 hours of calling medtronic.
But my new endocrine did not understand why I just keep a spare off pump prescriptions in my meter versus getting them filled. even when I told her crap does not happen at home. it happens at 11 pm on a Saturday 3 states away where you cannot find your pharmacy to just get an emergency refill. I guess I just won’t follow doctors orders.
Also get a emergency script for syringes, some states require them living in a state that doesn’t I have ran in the problem of they would give me insulin but nothing to get it into my body with.
My pump broke while I was in Florida. I am a Canadian, I had no lantus with me and no spare pump. I attached the link to my blog with the whole story.
God Bless Medtronic customer service!
I hate when you pass through security and are faced with an idiot!
The same thing happened to me only once, ironically it was when flying home from Arizona.
Maybe the same person?
About ten years ago we went to Vienna, Austria to visit our daughter. On the flight to Vienna I discovered my resevoir was almost empty, so went to change it. Oh my! In the stress of packing I had packed the almost empty bottle of insulin instead of the full one. I could have kissed the pharmacist at the corner pharmacy who ordered me a new vial from Germany. She was willing to do it because the perscription label was on the insulin box. Lesson learned (I hope!).
If it makes you feel better, I dropped a baggie of insulin and both vials broke. Lesson learned: half it and put them in seperate places.
I also had a pump failure on Christmas.
Glad you had a good time. I am often called by patients who have out of town relatives visiting who have mishaps. I always tell them I was glad to be able to help out, and just keep moving forward. When disaster strikes, learn from it, be prepared the next time, and then stop thinking about it.
Very interesting post! I don’t travel by plane nearly as often, but I get a bit frustrated by it too. Hard to look after diabetes while traveling. And if there is a time difference involved, then my BS numbers are messed up for days it seems…
When i’m away from home, on top of my regular pump and meter supplies (double the quantity) I always have my old insulin pump as a backup, an extra insulin cartridge, an one insulin pen. then bring along an extra cartridge of basal insulin. Of course an extra glucose meter.
The TSA is laughable sometimes!!! ridiculous.
I can’t complain about Medtronic’s pump replacement service – I accidently drowned my pump in a river in Belize and after calling them via radio phone from the middle of the jungle, they were able to get a new one to me within two and half days.
omg that DOA photo of your insulin bottle is scary-looking! (it’s my nightmare to pull it out of my bag and see that!) I’ve never had that happen (30 years T1D), but I did once have the air cabin pressure empty a new reservoir I was trying to fill in the airplane, so I lost a lot of insulin at the beginning of a trip – bummer. I’ve also soaked my pump and had MMD replace it toute de suite.
I’m traveling in 2 weeks from Boston to Denver, so this is a really timely post!
Business idea: design insulin bottle bumpers, same idea as iPhone bumpers-so they don’t break when you drop the bottle. Charge $29 for each piece of glorified rubber. You could display them at pharmacies where people pick up their insulin and have designer colors and everything from hot pink to leopard skin.
Walgreens does sell a rubber bottle bumper in red and blue; one is for long-acting, the other for rapid. I think they cost a couple of bucks.
Thanks for the advice! I’m traveling across the country next month (yeah, I know some people do it every day!), and I’ll sure remember to get a prescription for Lantus (and Novolog pens, while I’m at it) when I see my endo before that. I’ll also bring those TSA docs, just in case. Paper is easy to carry, it doesn’t break, and it doesn’t expire. Good idea!
Had a TSA droid in Phoenix last time insist that I take off my pump and put it through the X-ray with laptop…including, she said “all that tubing and whatever it’s attached to…..” I asked for a supervisor, and she backed down on that.
But, then snatched my wallet out of the tray (you have to take even non-metallic stuff out where they have the new “nude-o-scope” scanners) and disappeared out of my sight to “put it through the x-ray again.”
There’s no doubt that the TSA is providing employment for the unemployable, and sharply reducing airline revenue. I know that I’ve about tripled the radius in which I choose to drive rather than fly.
And there is the TSA screamer in Hartford last week, who kept shouting “take off your cell phone” and wasn’t interested in stopping her shouting long enough to listen to an explanation.
The natural hassle of all the stuff we have to carry is bad enough, but the TSA’s inconsistency is the last straw.
When I travel I have my bottles of insulin the box they come in. They don’t break in the box & the box has the prescription label on the box. I also make sure that I bring my TSA docs & all my doctor’s note docs when I fly in case the agent needs some education. If I have a problem I ask to speak to a supervisor and that usually stops the insanity. Its good to keep a check list of everything we pumpers have to bring that way when we fly we will not forget stuff. Plus I always give myself plenty of time as a cushion because the TSA agent will go through my stuff every time and take forever because I have to EDUCATE them again. I love this story it helps me prepare for when I travel. ((Hugs to all the Pumpers))
Sometimes the button error happens due to moisture getting in. Happened to me once on a Saturday (pump out of warranty and Medtronic help 2 days away). Leaving it in dry place for few hours got it back to working fine.
I had the same button error on a family vacation down to Australia. I was on a small island on the Great Barrier Reef 40 miles off the coast. In my case I had tucked my pump under a wetsuit for snorkeling. When I got out of the water the pump was frozen. I was able to get through to Medtronic and learned (the hard way) that if a button is depressed for over 30 minutes the pump disables and there’s no way to clear it.
It was a long night taking Novolog every two hours. Fortunately I had my backup pump in a suitcase back at the mainland airport – I always take it on international trips. If you get a new pump don’t turn in the old one, it may come in handy some day.
What TSA docs are people referring to. I have a doctors (endo) listing my DM1 and needs for suppies,pump. etc.
This happened to me, and it’s funny when you say they will brake on a saturdat night cuz yes it was saturday too and not only that, monday was a holiday too, such is luck
[...] about a blog post from Diabetes Mine. Allison Nimlos, the writer who has type 1 diabetes and is a regular blogger for diabetesmine.com, went to a wedding and the bottle of insulin she was using broke, then her pump [...]