Glad someone else caught this. I wrote about this in the complaint section too and said pretty much everything you did. It's possible, as a type 1 diabetic, that she passed out from getting too high - but that would have required her to have eaten a bunch without taking any insulin. 1) I doubt she's eating that much 2) I highly doubt she would forget about the giant bag of insulin they are lugging around with them and skip a shot. No other real reason she would faint and insulin would be the fix. And taking a shot while she's low would kill her. In truth, the girl probably needed a banana, not insulin, but that would have taken all the drama away. (She would have needed the insulin, of course. But not at that moment.)

Going too high is called diabetic ketoacidosis. It's basically a coma and it's extremely life threatening. The insta-shot would not have helped.

This far into the ZA, finding enough insulin would be next to impossible, and keeping it cold, think, really would be impossible. My dad is a type 1 diabetic, so we've actually talked about how we would keep him, you know, keep him around, and we've decided it would be incredibly difficult. My guess is the writers thought, "Diabetes!" and didn't do their homework about how the disease actually works.

Edit: Just confirmed this with my dad. He said, "If she passed out because her blood sugar is too high, she has a lot of other problems to worry about. Her kidneys are probably failing too."

Edit 2: Because there seems to be some confusion, I should point out that my dad was exaggerating/joking about her kidneys actually failing at that point. (Sarcasm does not translate well via computer, I guess.) He just meant that she there are signs about your blood sugar being too high; it wouldn't have come on that suddenly. Like me, he thinks she was probably low and the writers messed up.

 

I still think she needed a Goo goo cluster. It was just a big writer Goo Goo cluster ****.

 

I've been a type 1 for 31 years since age 5. You can certainly pass out if you're in DKA. They told her to drink some water, something else you do when blood sugars are very high. Just because you go into DKA and get to that point, doesn't mean your kidneys are failing. But you can be losing weight, feel very tired, like the flu, and then get to a point of passing out from the hyperglycemia. If it's a few years into the ZA, chances are (as others have mentioned) insulin supply is very low. Food isn't needed necessarily to raise your BG up; lack of insulin can be deadly, sometimes quickly (arguably, this would take a day or two). So, maybe she's been without insulin for a good while and this was the point. Still, she did seem to go from OK to "passing out High" quickly... and while the insulin shot effects could begin within an hour or so to start helping her, this was also pretty quick recovery.... Granted, it's TV.

My verdict, as a longtime type 1: Pretty accurate, more than we've often seen in other shows and movies.

 

Yeah, it was so unrealistic. We also have diabetics in our family and it doesn't work like this.

They need regular normal meals, or at least snacks, not just "BAM! Insulin shot! Now everything is gonna be okay". Not at all. Long lasting physical activity also requires food and insulin adjustment compared to their normal days. They have to be pretty careful in a normal world even. No diabetic person will be able to go hiking in a forest for days on a glass of water and some insulin shots.

Hell I'm not even diabetic but once I only ate a small peanut butter sandwich in the morning, didn't have time to eat all day, then in the evening I went for my spinning class and like 8-10 minutes into the class I started to feel dizzy then I nearly fainted and the instructor had to bring me a very sugary lemonade from the bar to help.

In a ZA If somehow the lack of insulin doesn't kill them, then it will be the lack of proper food and snacks. Especially because most of the survivors live a physically demanding life. (Let's not talk about the care for their skin, feet etc.)

 

It's very interesting that multiple people with personal experiences with diabetes are giving mixed answers as to the accuracy of this episode.

I know little about diabetes, but is it possible for it to cause different effects for different people if not properly treated?

 

But they had the insulin with them. Daryl got away because she swooned ,they had to chose to ignore her symptoms while they had a bag of insulin.

 

i dont know much about diabetes or if this scene was accurate or not, but my thought is that it must be super hard to be a diabetic in this world and depend on taking insulin shots and finding those insulin shots

 

Bear in mind, this is a show where a man can survive two months plus change in a coma without any food or water.

 

The girl must have had a restaurant employee staying back with her, bringing her meals three times a day off screen.

 

I've been a Type 1 for 23 years. I have seen many tv shows where they depict diabetics as getting kind of tipsy and passing out (more than likely from a low blood sugar attack) and they solve it by giving them an injection of insulin. Most of them draw in a huge amount into the syringe and inject. Problem solved. Seeing this time and time again, it scares me to think that this is how some people get educated about how to treat Diabetics.
I'm going to throw a little knowledge out there so help.

Type 1 Diabetics - Pancreas does not produce any insulin anymore. Must rely on regular insulin injections and eating food and constant monitoring of blood sugar levels (mostly by pricking fingers and using a blood glucose meter). Eating food raises the blood sugar, insulin lowers blood sugar. The Diabetic must work at figuring out how much insulin to take for the food they ate as well as how much physical activity or inactivity they may be doing.

Type 2 Diabetics - Pancreas produces little to some insulin. More than likely, blood sugar levels can be controlled by exercise and a healthy diet. Pills can also be taken to help stabilize the blood sugar levels. Type 2s should also check their blood sugar levels regularly but not doesn't have to be as to the same extent as Type 1s. Some Type 2s also take injections of insulin from time to time depending on how severe their Diabetes is.

Diabetic Ketoacidosis (DKA) - Diabetic ketoacidosis (DKA) is a serious condition that can lead to diabetic coma or even death. May be caused by hyperglycemia (high blood glucose) or hypoglycemia (low blood glucose) in people with diabetes. When your cells don't get the glucose they need for energy, your body begins to burn fat for energy, which produces ketones. Ketones are chemicals that the body creates when it breaks down fat to use for energy. The body does this when it doesn’t have enough insulin. When the body cannot make enough insulin, the food you eat gets digested and broken down into a sugar your body's cells can use. This is glucose, one of the simplest forms of sugar. When ketones build up in the blood, they make it more acidic. They are a warning sign that your diabetes is out of control or that you are getting sick. High levels of ketones can poison the body. When ketone levels get too high, you can develop DKA. DKA may happen to anyone with diabetes, though it is rare in people with type 2.

My own thoughts on the episode last night is she was acting like she was having a low blood sugar attack from not eating anything for a while. If the blood sugar is too low, you DO NOT administer insulin unless you want that person to go into shock and more than likely will die. A lot of shows just give the version of "Oh this person is a Diabetic and they need insulin injections when they are having an attack" (not ever stating which kind of attack they are having). Injection is given and ta-da it's a miracle the person is up on their feet like nothing happened. Insulin doesn't work immediately. That's not the way it works and I really wish they'd do their homework first. Insulin doesn't work immediately. Injections of insulin can take 20 min and upwards to star working. Same with food. Blood sugars need to be given time to readjust either way, up or down.
If the writers planned on giving Tina DKA last night, they should have explained the problem..not just let the assumptions fly by showing a cooler with the word Insulin on it and then showing her collapsing and needing an injection.
I hope this has educated some of you a little more.

 

I think they actually dealt with that in the webisode(I think it was called "the pact" or "oath" or something like that). There was a doctor(who was more then a little unhinged) hiding in the hospital , who died maybe shortly before Rick woke up.

 

May it should have read "insulin AND D50W" just for us nurses.

 

Where oh where is [MENTION=16181]SaraBlossom[/MENTION] when we need her?

 

I'd give them a pass on the insulin, as some diabetics have problems if their sugars are too high or too low, and I'd assume she and her friends know pretty much what she needs at this point.

As I put in the the complaints thread, what bothers me so much is the softball AMC threw by having her get bitten by walkers rather than have her get down to a syringe of insulin and having to decide what to do, to go back to where there's more, or stay or die. AMC took the cheap way out, and I don't like it.

 

Bear in mind, this is a show where the dead don't die but rise again after death and eat human flesh (even though they don't seem to need to eat to prevent themselves going hypo).

 

My thinking is that we're now roughly a couple years (or more?) into this Zombie Apocalypse, so it's more a matter of "extreme lack of insulin being available anywhere" so she's using it very sporadically to basically just survive.Probably hovering in high blood sugar levels most of the time, and just avoiding DKA... except when craziness happens, like you're on the run from crazy people hunting you. That's my take.