One practical thing that might make a difference. I load up a full 100 unit syringe at a time, but only use from 2 to a max of 14 units at a time. This is really handy. I carry a preloaded syringe to work in a toothbrush case for travelers.
That might help because I think the rubber at the top of the vial is a lot tougher than my skin, and that way the syringe doesn't have to go through it so often. Also the rubber seems to be softer in the middle than around the edge. If anyone is getting damaged or dulled syringes maybe that's where it happens?
Here's a quote from the largest study I've read about reusing syringes. It covered about 560,000 injections, equal to 5 a day for more than 300 years.
"A Prospective Study of the Hazards of Multiple Use of Disposable Syringes and Needles in Intensified Insulin Therapy" by R. Chlup, E. Marsalek, and W. Burns. Published in Diabetic Medicine. 7(7):624-7, 1990 Aug.
"Each syringe was reused for 1 to 12 weeks; each needle for 4 to 200 injections (average 41) within 1 to 40 days (average 11.2). In a total of 560,000 of injections no relevant signs of infection could be found. In rare cases slight redness not exceeding 4 mm square could be seen at the injection sites."
"Thus, the repeated use of syringes and needles in one diabetic patient may be recommended as a convenient and safe approach in insulin administration."
They also mentioned in the study that there was a wide variety in the hygiene of the people taking part of it. Some of them were quite clean, and some were at the other end of that spectrum.
So basically it seems to be extremely safe. In fact the rate of infections is the same for people reusing syringes as it is for people using new syringes. If you are going to puncture the skin there is some risk.
At least, Injections - 560,000, Infections - 0 is a nice lopsided score.
An interesting part of the study related to those photos is the syringes used 200 times for up to 12 weeks. How is the syringe in the photo of the 6th injection going to get to 7, let alone 200? It's not humanly possible. With damage happening at that rate there wouldn't even be a millimeter of needle left.
I'm near sighted, and guessing that some of the posters are far sighted maybe? To me it's quite easy to see and quite clear. I only did have 2 syringes out of quite a few hundred ever got anything like the damage they show from one injection. The magnification doesn't matter much if you just look at the size of the hook compared to the size of the needle.
And the overall average from the study is interesting. 41 injections per syringe certainly does bring the cost down.
There's more to it, but tired of typing
bye for now
lia