Peter’s Story

 

I’m Peter Bailey, the inventor of TickleFLEX and now FLEXtend.

I’m Type 1 and have been injecting for nearly two decades. TickleFLEX has really helped in eliminating discomfort and bruising, but over many years the injections have been taking their toll. I often found my injection frustrated by local gristle and scar tissue that made the insulin diffusion rate unreliable. I have learned that this is a relatively common complication known as lipohypertrophy.

I’ve been telling people unsure about how hard to press TickleFLEX against the skin that optimally it is like if you were pushing the pen by the delivery button. One day I had a flash of inspiration. If I put the pen into a closed end tube and pushed the tube it would apply the perfect pressure for injecting and naturally operate the delivery button. Crucially I could then grip the tube with my thumb at the needle end and thereby reach all those places which previously were inaccessible. For the last 6 months testing FLEXtend I have been able to rest the damaged parts of my body as I took advantage of all the new space. I made and optimised the tube with a notch to help with control and called it FLEXtend as it extends the range of TickleFLEX. It is a devastatingly simple product, but oh so effective and has been a great help in managing my condition