Long-acting insulins include the drugs glargine and detemir. In this mnemonic video, we'll cover the most important things to know about the long-acting insulins and give you an easy way to remember them. So you'll be ready for test day. For today's video, we're visiting an old cathedral which has turned into a crime scene for a mysterious murder. The detective is searching the place for clues and to do so, he has removed the walls.
exposing the cathedral's insulation. These sure are long pieces of insulation to reach all the way to the tall ceiling. By the way, the insulation here is our symbol for insulin. Get it?
Insulation for insulin. And since these pieces of insulation are so long, that can help you remember that we are talking about long-acting insulin. Let's move on to talk about the drug names of the long-acting insulins. Like you would expect, This cathedral has gargoyles in it. The gargoyle is our symbol for the first long-acting insulin you need to know, glargine, because gargoyles sound similar to glargine, right?
In clinical practice, you will often hear glargine called by its brand name, Lantus, but the NCLEX will usually only give you the generic name of glargine. This detective is determined to solve the murder, even if that means removing the walls to inspect the insulation. The determined detective is the symbol for the second long-acting insulin drug, detemir. Get it? Because detective sounds similar to detemir?
Again, detemir in clinical practice is often called by its brand name, levomir. But now that you have this detective in a long trench coat to remind you, you should have no problem on test day remembering that detemir is a long-acting insulin. The press is really putting the pressure on the detective to catch the murderer. The murder is on the front page of the daily newspaper.
By the way, this daily newspaper can remind you that long-acting insulins are usually given once a day, usually in the evening. Additionally, long-acting insulins don't have a peak. Instead, their action is a slow, long burn that lasts about 24 hours or one day.
Functionally, this means that long-acting insulins like detemir or glargine are useful for administering the baseline of blood sugar in patients. in the absence of meals or other spikes from eating. In other words, the long-acting insulins work to counteract the natural rate of glucose release by the liver. Clinically, most diabetics will use a combination of long-acting insulins to adjust their baseline blood sugar levels, as well as rapid-acting insulins to deal with glucose spikes after meals. Finally, the detective is spraying the insulation with a special spray that will show if blood is present.
This spray cannot be mixed with anything or the results might be messed up, compromising the investigation. Just like this chemical can't be mixed, long-acting insulins also cannot be mixed in the same syringe with other insulins. Let me repeat, long-acting insulins must be in their own syringe. If a patient needs to receive a long-acting insulin and, say, a rapid-acting insulin, they'll need to get two different injections. Yeah.
That's a bummer for the patient, but it's important to do this to ensure that the insulins work properly in the body. And that's everything for long-acting insulins. Let's quickly summarize what we've learned here.
Long-acting insulins include the drugs glargine and detemir. Long-acting insulins are given once daily, have no peak, and instead work steadily over a duration of around 24 hours. Long-acting insulins cannot be mixed. They must be given in their own syringe.
Hopefully the detective can solve this murder soon. I'll stick around and help look for clues, and you continue on with your studying. Thanks for watching, and I'll catch you in the next one.