Lori Berard, RN, CDE, Diabetes Educator, goes through the steps of how to inject insulin safely and effectively.
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Safe and Effective Insulin Injection Technique Lori Berard, RN, CDE, Diabetes Educator, goes through the steps of how to inject insulin safely and effectively.Featuring Lori Berard, RN, CDE, Diabetes Nurse Educator
Duration: 1 minute, 47 seconds
Before you give your insulin injection, the first thing that you should do is gather your supplies and wash your hands. The next step is preparing your insulin pen for injection. It’s very important that you use a new needle each time that you’re going to do an injection, and also it’s really important that you prime your pen.
So typically, we prime the pen with two units, but some manufacturers recommend three. Know what your pen recommends for a priming dose. What you do is you take off the outer cap of the pen needle. After you’ve screwed it on, you take off the outer cap, you take off the inner cap.
You dial in whatever the recommendation is from the manufacturer, whether it’s two or three units. Holding the pen upright, you depress the plunger until you see a drop of insulin at the tip of the pen. Return the dose to zero, and now you’re ready to prepare your dose.
After your pen is primed, you should dial in the dose that you’re required to take. Next, you’re going to pick the site that you’re going to use. Make sure the site is clean, and that you’re not injecting into any area of lipohypertrophy. Then, you’ll inject your pen needle in a 90-degree angle into the site that you’ve chosen, depress the plunger, hold it down for 10 seconds.
Once that’s done, you’ll remove the insulin pen in the same angle in which you inserted it. Your injection is now complete, next you should take your outer cover of your pen needle to remove the pen needle and put it in the sharps container.
So, helpful tips for you as you move forward with your injections is always rotate your sites and rotate within your sites. There’s a lot of space that you can use within each injection zone. Also, you want to make sure that you’re using a clean needle each time that you’re injecting, and if you have any questions about that you should be asking your healthcare provider.
Presenter: Lori Berard, Nurse, Winnipeg, MB
Local Practitioners: Nurse
This content is for informational purposes only, and is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Always seek the advice of your physician or other qualified healthcare professional with any questions you may have regarding a medical condition.