Diabetes Camp-Blood Sugar Checks

All in all, about 60 youth ranging in age from 8 to 25 attended the diabetes youth camp. They came from all socioeconomic backgrounds and various experience and years managing diabetes. We took over 5 cabins, at a local campsite, for each of the various age groups. I, Maggie, and Lorena, from La Paz who also has diabetes, managed nine 12 to 14 yr old girls. We needed all three monitors for all that was required of us.

Very excitable girls greeted me. The very first thing we did after introductions was to check everyone's blood sugar level. Although, the girls only check their levels twice a day, once in the morning and once at night due to costs of the strips, we had them check about 6x a day. With my minimal training testing a couple kid's blood sugar levels at the malnourished children's center, I set out to help.

Their levels were surprisingly, or not, all over the map. One girl's level was even over 400 whereas a normal blood sugar range for someone without diabetes is 80 to 120. Our schedule for the rest of the camp was to check the blood sugar levels at 7:30 am, 10:30am, noon, 2:30pm, 6:00pm, 10:30pm and 1am, and 3am if they were low. Thankfully, we had enough test strips, lancets, alcohol swabs and insulin to last all four days for everyone.

After a lot of exercise, their blood sugar level would drop quite a bit and I often had to keep careful watch of Anihi who almost passed out twice after too much exercise, something her body was just not use to doing. At one check, I fumbled checking her blood sugar level as Maggie kept her conscious and Jairo helped me finish it. We gave her coke and cookies to raise her level. After just a minute of drinking the coke, she suddenly perked up and was ready to play again. I had to keep her seated so that her body had time to recover. After that, I felt like I had been given a tremendous amount of responsibility with very little training.


Due to my inexperience, another volunteer showed me and 3 others, who have no experience with needles and syringes, how to put air in the insulin bottles and then how to draw out the correct amounts as well as how to draw up 2 different types of insulin with one syringe. After that tutorial, I was able to competently teach the kids as well as the local endocrinologist assigned to my group, who didn't seem to be all together there, the proper method.

Checking the girl's blood sugar level at night provided me the most peace. I would enter into each of their rooms while they slept and prick their finger to check their level. If it was low, I would wake them up and give them coke and crackers to eat. I then had to check their level again 15 min later. If it was still low, I had to give them more to eat. Then, Lorena would check their level again at 3am to make sure it was okay. The night I had off, poor Maggie was up all night checking blood sugars because all the kids were low. I guess they had way too much exercise that day.

Where to inject insulin is often an issue since the girls have their favorite places. However, by always injecting in the same places, the skin becomes hard. We encouraged them to try other places despite their fear. We taught them ways to roll their arms against their knees to get a better angle to inject in the fatty area. They learned from each other as well. I, also, learned greatly from them too and enjoyed the vicarious as well as interactive role that I played. Fun stuff to be written about later.