Taking short-acting insulin with other medicines and herbal supplements - Brand names: Actrapid, Humulin S

Cautions with other medicines

Some medicines can increase your blood glucose levels and some can reduce your levels. You might need to adjust your insulin dose if you start or stop these medicines.

Always check with your doctor, diabetes nurse or pharmacist when starting or stopping a medicine.

Medicines that can reduce your blood glucose levels include:

• any other medicines used to treat diabetes, such as metformin, dapagliflozin, empagliflozin, pioglitazone, gliclazide, glimepiride, alogliptin, linagliptin, saxagliptin, sitagliptin, semaglutide, dulaglutide, liraglutide or exenatide
• angiotensin converting enzyme (ACE) inhibitors, used to treat high blood pressure and heart failure, such as enalapril, ramipril or perindopril
• anabolic steroids such as testosterone

Medicines that can reduce your blood glucose levels and reduce your awareness of the symptoms of hypos include beta blockers such as atenolol, propranolol or metoprolol. These are used to treat conditions including high blood pressure and heart disease. You'll need to carefully monitor your blood glucose if you're taking beta blockers.

Medicines that can increase your blood glucose levels include:

• thiazide diuretics (medicines that make you pee more) such as bendroflumethiazide, used to treat high blood pressure and build-up of fluid
• steroid tablets and steroid injections, such as dexamethasone, prednisolone or hydrocortisone, used to treat inflammatory conditions and allergies (steroid creams that you put on your skin will not generally affect your blood glucose)
• levothyroxine, used to treat thyroid disease
• contraceptive pills

Mixing short-acting insulin with herbal remedies and supplements

Many herbal remedies are advertised to help control diabetes and some have been shown to reduce blood glucose levels. If you take insulin, never start or stop taking a herbal remedy without getting advice from your doctor, pharmacist or diabetes nurse.

It's not possible to say that any herbal remedies and supplements are safe to take with insulin. They're not tested in the same way as pharmacy or prescription medicines. They're generally not tested for the effect they can have on other medicines.