Starting Insulin In Type 2 Diabetes

chronic care clinical topics diabetes endocrine May 26, 2020

The good news: there are a lot of options for treating patients with type 2 diabetes. The challenging news: there is a lot to know about medication options for your patient with type 2 diabetes. Getting comfortable with all this information can be overwhelming as a new grad Nurse Practitioner – and even as a seasoned Nurse Practitioner, especially if you don’t have a lot of diabetic patients in your practice. Some patients will be able to improve their diabetes and get their A1C down with lifestyle changes alone; others will need to add oral medication; others will need to add insulin to get optimal control of their diabetes.

When the time comes to have a conversation with your patient about starting insulin, they are likely to have lots of questions. If you want some talking points for this conversation, and you also want to be sure that you have answers, you have come to the right place.

What You Need To Know To Start Insulin In Your Type 2 Diabetes Patient

This week, we will walk through what you need to know when you have a patient who will be starting insulin for diabetes management. We’ll talk about:

The other options for treating their type 2 diabetes before you start insulin
How much improvement you can expect with various approaches to diabetes treatment
A framework for when to start insulin, and how to adjust the dose
Managing hypoglycemia after starting insulin
Why in-person visits are so beneficial for managing diabetes

Diabetes is a complex diagnosis for providers and patients. When you feel confused and overloaded with information, imagine how your patient feels. Being prepared for these conversations and clinical scenarios will help you to feel more confident, which will help you to be an even better resource for your patients.

Resources mentioned in this episode:

If you'd like support learning about how to manage these three chronic conditions, including medication management, most recent guidelines, when to refer and examples of real-life patient cases, join us for the Managing Diabetes, Hypertension & CKD Review Course. Comes with 10.35 hours of continuing education, including 2.8 pharmacology hours, downloadable cheat sheets and lifetime access! Click here to learn more.