A.J. Walker

Multiple Sclerosis etc

Self Jabbing

Hopefully come up with some more imaginative names for any further Copaxone related blogs. That said, maybe I wont need to do many more on Copaxone anyway: after all if things go smoothly with it then I wont be saying much about it. So fingers crossed I won’t get to Fast & Furious (or indeed Rambo) numbers.

The nurse came today after the delivery arrived yesterday morning. When the package arrived in a large plastic bag yesterday, taped up with contents to be put in fridge stamped on it, I was briefly alarmed at its size wondering how much of the fridge would be left for actual food and drink. But when I opened the bag the bulk of it proved to be the Yellow Sharps Bin and a blue zip case for the CSYNC auto-injector. The actual part of the package that needs to be refrigerated is just the small box of syringes. After all I only need to inject myself three times a week. So a month’s supply is just 12 syringes. The delivery included a CSYNC comes with a big thick glossy book, but like every device manual - be it an air fryer, a strimmer, a car, or a CSYNC auto-injector system - this is because it is presented in every conceivable language on earth. And there is only actual four pages that relate to the instructions in each language: and unclear instructions at that.

I had a read of the manual before the nurse arrived intending to be primed and ready to go; but the manual was confusing and I was soon of the opinion it was likely a lot easier than the steps presented in text form and that I’d be thankful for a nurse visit. It was pretty damn straighforward. The nurse also pointed out there was a fold away illustration inside the booklet which was much clearer than the text - though the inside of the booklet were not effectively pointed within the document. They’d have been better off just producing a glossy of the pictures presented in the inlay. A picture paints a thousand words and all that.

The nurse took out her own injection kit - filled with saline - along with a little padded device about the size of a bar of soap, to represent a belly or leg muscle and duly went through the entire process, before watching me do it for real.

It really was quite straightforward. I think. I dare say it’ll take me longer than it should the first few times doing it on my own, but I’ll get there.

The actual needle going in (set to ‘8’ - which I think equates to 8mm) didn’t hurt much. You notice it a little, but it is not of undue concern. I could feel it a bit later and there was a very slight reddening, but less than my arms were after the sunshine camping last week. And it wasn’t long before I couldn’t feel anything had happened there and the reddening had gone.

I chose to inject into my belly (a big enough target and easy to reach) on the left hand side. You are told to rotate the positions, so I’ll be right hand side next time. After that I may try a leg to see how that works for me (set to 4 or 6 instead of 8). I think you can stick to legs or belly as long as you don’t keep putting the needle in roughly the same place. Being only three times a week it’s less of an issue than it could be for a drug needed to be injected more frequently.

In summary: it wasn’t painful. It’s a little fiddly inserting the syringe into the auto-injector and then emptying and disposing the needle into the Yellow Sharps Bin. I’m sure it will quickly become second nature. It’s only a few hours after and I’ve not felt any issues to far, hopefully that will continue to be the case.

It was good news on the delivery front as the nurse said that they could deliver to a pharmacy for pick up from there. They’d asked about a neighbour on the phone when I last spoke to them, but a pharmacy is much more straightforward (as long as I don’t tell them to come on a Sunday and mess that up).

Anyway, so far so good. Onwards And Upwards.
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