How long do you make a pen last when titrating down or on maintenance?

[RockinCara]

I was wondering how long you guys titrating down or on maintenance have used a pen for? Im a little nervous about how long this pen is lasting. Wondering whether I should bin it, but reluctant to because 15mg pens are so expensive!

I’m currently titrating down with a view to coming off MJ, despite having a stone left. I was on 12.5mg in May and when I started the last pen of my stockpile from September I decided to work my way down. It’s a 15mg pen. I took 10mg the first time, then have reduced the dose by 1mg each time. I’ve also lengthened the days between doses, often because I just forget. It’s usually about 10 days, sometimes longer. Which means I have been using the pen for about 3 months and even if I stick on 5mg, where I am now, I could still get another 3 months out of this pen!
Ive had a couple of occasions where I have had quite bad trapped wind during the night when I’ve jabbed. Strange because I’ve not had the slightest side effect during the 14 months I’ve been on MJ. One of the reasons for coming off is I don’t feel much suppression and still have food noise, despite going up the pens.

Are you keeping it in the fridge and scrupulous with the wipes when you use it? Is the liquid still perfectly clear with no cloudiness or floaters?

Yes.
it’s happened twice, but not on consecutive injections. The last time was a month ago. I’ve done two injections inbetween. I’m sure it’s just coincidence. It just got me wondering how much people maintaining stretch pens out.

The wind sounds like coincidence.

To answer your question, I double my pens on maintenance...so 2.5mg from a 5mg or 1.5mg from a 2.5mg pen. With the 5th dose, this was 2.5 months, now it's 2 months. That's my limit on the level of risk I'll personally tolerate - I've been doing this for over a year with no issues. There's no strong medical evidence either way; by splitting doses we're going against manufacturer's recommendations obviously, but can take sensible steps to mitigate risk, but I'd be concerned using a pen for 6 months if only because the active ingredients might lose efficacy. If you're just using a final pen before coming off that probably matters less to you.

I had a stock of 10mg pens that I used to titrate down as it was easier to calculate the clicks. 45 for 7.5mg, 30 for 5mg, 15 for 2.5mg. I'm in maintenance and on 2.5 every 2-3 weeks.

Going completely off license, I use a 15 pen for around 6 months for micro dosing, never had a problem,
A risk that only you can decide upon.

If you’ve had that pen since last September and using it for much longer than 2 months, I’d ditch it. Although it might not be contaminated, I wonder if the medicine might have degraded and is less effective now?

You could buy a couple of lower dose pens for maintenance starting with a 2.5mg and a 5mg and carry on titrating down?

I'm currently using a 7.5 pen to dose 5, so with the bonus dose i'll get 7 doses out of it. Which means it's open 6 weeks. I'm going to get a 5 pen next and take 2.5 from it, although I realise there isn't likely to be a bonus dose any longer in a 5 pen. So that'll be 8 doses/7 weeks open.

My pens have always stayed in the fridge all the time. Never seen a reason not to.

Thanks everyone, it’s interesting to hear what everyone else is doing. The pen is kept in the fridge, kept clean and has an expiry of April 27. I think I’ll see how the next couple of jabs are and decide then. I’ve just been lucky and not had the slightest side effects in 14 months, so it’s been a bit of a shock.

I would stretch to 12 weeks but prob not beyond. And that’s with it in the fridge the whole tome not taking it on holiday.

Open pens are only safe to use for 30 days as recommendations in the phablet that comes with it

I’ve been using my pens for 20 weeks, kept clean and in the fridge. Only inject every two weeks so ten doses from each pen. Haven’t noticed any loss of effectiveness.

I’m dosing 5mg from a 15mg pen so they are lasting about 14 weeks

Thank you.