The American Diabetes Association Guide to Insulin & Type 2 Diabetes addresses common fears about insulin therapy and what is involved with beginning to use insulin. Additional chapters discuss fine-tuning of insulin self-management, gadgets to make life easier, and troubleshooting steps to overcome any problems readers may have.

CUSTOMER REVIEWS (Average Customer Rating: 4.5 based on 4 reviews)

Good for New As Well As Experienced

This book is informative for both newbies and veteran diabetics. For myself, I realized I could adjust my insulin units based on how my body was reacting. That's something I didn't know I could do on my own. I've been a diabetic for over 10 years. This book has many narratives from different people so if you're new to diabetes, it's a great resource.
January 19, 2008

Insulin: The best medicine for diabetes

As a diabetes nurse educator, I find my biggest challenge of leading people into optimal blood sugar ranges is convincing them that it is important to start injecting insulin, a hormone their body is no longer making enough of. Next, they need to understand how to do the intensive insulin management their pancreas used to do, but now need to use their own brain to calculate their body's insulin needs. Diabetics will be able to see why they eventually need a before meal insulin correction dose for blood sugars plus enough extra insulin to cover the carbohydrates they eat. There are lots of actual examples from people living with diabetes, in their own words, so it is easy to identify real feelings. Ms. McCarren writes in an easy to read format with tables and charts which creates a simple guide to insulin therapy. I recommend this book to my new insulin starts and people ready to begin intensive insulin therapy. M. Ingram RN CDE

December 12, 2007

Interesting approach to understanding insulin

As a type 1 diabetic of thirty-five years, I always find it amusing how type 2s associate insulin with failure and are so afraid to take these tiny and generally painless injections. That said, the ADA's Guide to Insulin & Type 2 Diabetes is a lively little book to get type 2s more comfortable and familiar with the ins and outs of insulin use.

The guide's uniqueness lies in the fact that it includes patients' comments about using insulin from its online message board. For patients already acquainted with insulin, how to use it and all the basics, this makes an animated read. There is much to be gained, particularly emotionally, from reading the views of fellow new patient users. If you don't have a basic understanding of insulin and its use, however, this approach may be a little confusing and for that reason work against understanding clearly the critical information regarding insulin use.

All to say, if you know your insulin Ps & Qs this is a nice addition. If not, go for a basic primer first, and use this as follow-up therapy.
December 11, 2007

Insulin can mean better control

The doctor says it is time for insulin, but you are worried about the needles. Or you think it means your type 2 diabetes has worsened and there is no hope in avoiding complications. Or you're worried about weight gain.

Marie McCarren works to dispel the myths about insulin in this book. Using a balance of clinical guidelines and personal stories from the American Diabetes Association message boards, McCarren does an excellent job explaining all things insulin.

For instance, needles used to inject insulin are small. Better control can be found with insulin therapy and weight can be managed if insulin doses are correct. That is just a sample of answers found in this book.

The only thing missing are photographs of someone injecting insulin. While there are excellent graphs detailing how different insulins peak, I was disappointed not to see injections demonstrated.

Regardless, I plan on keeping this book around for my own reference should insulin become the answer for me in the future. I highly recommend it to anyone worried about their own insulin needs.
November 28, 2007

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