Golden dose advice please

[Possiges]

Hi all

Apologies in advance if this has been answered many times before, but I can’t find the answer to my 3 questions. I just finished my 4th dose of my first 2.5mg pen and there is a fair amount of liquid left. My 3 questions are:

1. why do people advise extracting the 5th dose with an insulin needle? I was given spare needle caps with the pen when I purchased it - is there a reason why I cannot just attach a new needle cap as before?

2. do I need to wait a full week before I inject the 5th dose? Or can I do it today (so basically start on 5mg early)? 2.5mg hasn’t really had much of an effect on me so I’d be keen to top up if that’s possible.

3. if I just use the same pen with a new needle cap, will it turn all the way to 1 on the dial? Or do I just turn it as far as it will go just to get the remaining liquid out?

thank you!

1. the pen mechanism locks after doing the normal 4 doses. You can try to force the mechanism by twisting it hard, which breaks the lock and allows the pen to turn. But, sometimes the whole mechanism internally breaks and the pen will no longer function. So, people just use a syringe.
2. you could do two injections today to jump to 5mg a week early but I personally wouldn’t. Each 2.5mg injection builds on the last, so after injecting the 4th dose of 2.5mg your levels will rise to the highest they’ve been to date.
3. the pen will only turn to 1, regardless.

That’s super helpful, thank you for the advice @SilenceInside

I just twisted the pen back as normal to get the extra dose from mine. It put up a tiny bit of resistance but worked and I use normal pen caps like you have. Worth a try. Just twist it hard in the usual direction

I couldn’t twist it but DH and a pair of pliers managed it! Wohoo!

With the syringe you can remove everything in there, with the hard twist, I also use pliers, you can only take a standard dose. The liquid remaining can be upto 1.5 doses or just less so with hard twist you can get 2.5mg, with a syringe could be 3.75mg so it bridges the gap between current and next dose and could be used the following week to get your body used to a slightly higher dose.

Thanks for the info! I used the pliers but only twisted it to 1 so just got one full dose and not 1.5. I threw it away after that but good to know for future reference there may be even more in there!

I wonder why they include so much extra

1. the pen locks after 240 clicks. So after 4 doses it won’t turn any more which is why you would use an insulin injection needle, even if you can extract by forcing the pen there is still more left!!
2. yes, or use the golden dose as 1.5 the regular dose
3. no, see above