Insulin Safety Week 2021 – Celebrating 100 years of insulin and improving diabetes care.
In Insulin Safety Week, from Monday 17 to Sunday 23 May, our diabetes nursing team are highlighting the work our staff are doing to improve diabetes care as well as celebrating 100 years of insulin.
The week aims to raise awareness to help reduce insulin errors and encourage health care staff to ensure the right person gets the right insulin in the right dose at the right time and in the right way, using the right device.
These are some of the ways staff across our Trust have been helping to improve diabetes care;
- As part of a pilot scheme, our Pre-Operative Assessment team have been providing patients with a helpful diabetes and surgery booklet to help them manage their diabetes if they are having surgery.
- Diabetes Perioperative Specialist Nurse Kim and the Diabetes and Anaesthetic teams have been working with patients and their GPs to help improve people’s blood sugars prior to surgery to reduce their risk of post-op complications and improve healing after surgery.
- Wards 2, 5 and the Charnwood Suite have been trialling a colour-coded blood glucose chart that will be used for adult patients to reduce the likelihood of diabetes harms such as hypoglycaemia and diabetic ketoacidosis.
This week the new blood glucose and ketone monitoring chart will be introduced across the hospital. This is colour coded to prompt early action and includes guidance information on the back. The chart should make it easier to identify trends that require medical adjustment.
During the trial using the chart staff reported they found the colour coded information useful and an audit showed an improvement in checking ketones.
During Insulin Safety Week our Diabetes Specialist Nurses will have a stand outside our chapel to give more information and to encourage support for patients with diabetes.
The team will also be talking to colleagues to provide guidance about best practice.
Some of the teams who have been trialling improvements to care include;
Our Pre-Op and Theatres teams.
Ward 2 team
Ward 5 team
Charnwood and Day Care teams