Patient/caregiver was educated on how to take Avandia use as follows:
- Take the medication at the same time, every day, to avoid forgetting the medication. Taking this medication at regularly spaced intervals along with compliance for recommended dietary measures helps to prevent any gross fluctuations in blood sugar numbers and maintain them in the target range. This can also help with preventing any undesired side-effects and toxicity with the medication.
- Maintain strict compliance with intake of the medication as ordered, with regards to dosage and frequency, to derive the benefit of the medication.
- Do not change the dose on avandia without consulting your physician.
- This medication can induce some nausea and vomiting, especially when taken on empty stomach. Taking the medication with a glass of water and some food or snack can help avoid these unpleasant gastrointestinal symptoms.
- Discuss with your physician or nutritionist regarding your recommended diet plan and calorie intake limitations, if any. Observe compliance with any recommendations made to derive the benefit of avandia intake. Grossly overeating or undereating in comparison to the recommended calorie intake can lead to poor blood sugar control and compromise the therapeutic benefit of avandia.
- Avandia starts peaking in action in about an hour after intake. Observe compliance with food intake accordingly, as recommended. Do not skip a meal, while taking any medications to regulate your blood sugars. Skipping a meal or undereating can bring the blood sugars down. Observing compliance with medication intake in the backdrop of skipped meal or undereating can lower the blood sugars to dangerous levels, thus precipitating an emergency.
- Determine your meal and snack times and strictly adhere to the time. Observing compliance with the time of nutrition intake and the time of medication intake, as recommended, can help significantly with the goals of establishing a discipline with regards to eating habits, streamlining the insulin release response, regulating blood sugar numbers at the desired level, and preventing development of undesired complications.
- Take the regular tablet as a whole with a glass of water. If you encounter difficulty swallowing the whole regular tablet, check with your doctor if you may cut the pill and swallow it in pieces with a glass of water. Usually tablets that can be cut bear a scoreline, displaying the line of cut. Check if your tablet has any. For individuals with severe swallowing difficulties, check with your doctor if you may also crush the tablet and swallow the powder. Cutting or crushing the tablet can make it easier to swallow but could give very unpleasant taste in the mouth. Sprinkling the powder on a spoonful of soft jelly or applesauce and swallowing the jelly or sauce along with the medication could make it easier.
- Observe compliance with taking your daily blood sugar readings, as recommended. Log maintenance of all the blood sugar readings help for a comparative feedback, as to how well the drug is helping control the blood sugars. Maintaining a log of dietary items consumed on each meal and snack can provide input with regards to foods that help/harm your plan for blood sugar regulation.
- Avandia can take some time, about 6 – 8 weeks, to fairly adjust to your body, before improvement in blood sugar control and stabilization of blood sugar readings is noticed. So, do not discontinue taking the medication without your physician’s consult, as you failed to see the desired result immediately after taking the medication.
- While taking avandia, notify your doctor of any continuing poorly controlled blood sugars. This can assist your doctor with increasing the dose of avandia or adding another medication to help better control your numbers on blood sugar. Also, notify your doctor regarding any continuing or worsening unpleasant side-effects of avandia use, so that, your dosage on the medication could be revised.
- If the blood sugars are getting too low with avandia use, despite compliance with recommended calorie intake, your dose of avandia may need to be revised or change of plan considered. Notify your physician regarding any overly corrected blood sugars with avandia use, resulting in episodes of hypoglycemia with extremely low blood sugars, confusion, and dizziness.
- Avandia is extensively metabolized in the liver and all the inactive metabolites are mainly excreted in urine by the kidneys. Individuals with compromised liver function cannot metabolize avandia normally. This results in the medication staying in circulation for longer time than normal and can be toxic. Individuals with history of compromised liver function must let their physician know regarding the same. While taking avandia, periodical labs could be ordered for evaluation of liver functions. So, maintain compliance with follow-up physician appointments and lab draws ordered, if any, for evaluation of liver function. Be accommodative to the changes in dose of avandia or treatment plan accordingly, to achieve an optimum blood sugar control response and prevent development of any undesired side-effects.
- If you miss a dose, try taking it at the earliest notice of noncompliance. If it is time for the next dose, skip the missed dose and take the dose scheduled. Do not take an extra dose to try making up for the missed dose, which can result in toxicity and an episode of dangerous hypoglycemia. Notify your doctor and other health care personnel regarding your dose noncompliance.
