Does anyone have a type one son or daughter who attend/s Purdue University? Looking for advice on room accommodations and roommates . Thanks this is so hard letting them go and handle night time battles alone!!
Aw, my heart goes out to you. My son is Type 1 and was accepted to Purdue, but he’ll be attending another college. He’s actually taking a gap year to deal mostly with health issues.
I would have your endo write a letter on behalf of your child and take it to the disability office. Whatever accommodations will insure the highest chance of success in helping to manage the diabetes and doing well at school, that is what the endo should advocate for.
I’d also look for quieter or a non-partying dorm. Having a safe space in which to manage diabetes (pump changes, etc) seems important.
If quick access to medical facilities is necessary or desired, you may want to check the campus map to see which residences have the quickest access to such.
Agree with ucb. That was something my son’s endo mentioned, as well. Think through what will be important for your son to have access to (whether that’s medical care, quick meals, quiet zone, etc), and advocate for those.
When does he need to chose a dorm/roommate?
Definitely have him register with the disabilities office. He can have a single room if he so chooses (some parents feel better with a roommate but my daughter didn’t want to wake a roommate up and keeps a different schedule than most due to various health problems.)
Other accommodations to request: being able to take pump, meter, snacks, CGM receiver etc. into the classroom (including beeps!). Extra breaks during exams to do diabetes tasks (my daughter’s school gave her exams in a separate room). Excused absences or tardiness due to blood sugar issues (being too low to walk across campus, waking up vomiting from a high due to pump insertion failure etc.)
Many teach roommates how to do glucagon. Be aware that across the country, almost all states (I believe Wisconsin may be the exception) EMT’s are not allowed to do glucagon (or test blood sugar for that matter).
Mine got through college an hour from home but is now heading off for PhD on the other coast. DexCom’s continuous glucose monitor has a new technology that allows me to see her blood sugar chart and trends from 3,000 miles away.
Unlike sbjdorlo’s son’s school, which has its own teaching hospital for its medical school, Purdue seems to have only a student health clinic which is not open 24 hours (see http://www.purdue.edu/push/ ). Some Purdue dorms are closer to the student health clinic than others. The nearest hospitals for after hours care are not within quick walking distance.
Thank you, compmom, for your wonderful comments about disability support services and accommodations. Students with medical/physical disabilities need to contact the institution’s disability offices as soon as they know they will attend a particular school. If you linger, you may find that the kind of room you want has already been assigned. Compmom listed the kinds of accommodations her daughter received. Accommodations are not like a cafeteria where you pick what you want. Instead, your documentation and your requests will be discussed with someone at disability services. For example, her daughter had a single room. Another option at some schools could be an area of a dormitory where medically fragile students are housed. You may want to discuss time and which cafeteria.
So, contact disability services as soon as the decision to attend a school is made. Also, get your documentation sent immediately so accommodations specific to you can be discussed. Compmom described what her daughter received. but her student’s accommodations are specific to her. Not your wish list. Oh, because you are a high school graduate/18, the student will discuss their condition the disability office, not the parents. Be sure, student, that you have a good grasp of your disability and needs for accommodations because you are in charge of your own actions and interactions. If you student want your parent notified to discuss you with disability or health services or…you will need to complete a form giving your permission–often signed at each place,
Have a great year at Purdue!
There have been a couple of threads here on CC about Type 1 and roommates etc. I was always glad that my son had a roommate, rather than a single room, although there was quite a heated discussion on what the roommates “responsibility” is. I would not expect the roommate to learn how to give glucogan, but I would make sure your student discusses his/her diabetes with the roommate so they can act and call 911 etc. if they see something off. Hopefully your student has his/her diabetes under control (as much as possible). Unfortunately my student was diagnosed while in college so he was getting use to everything in the college setting. The upside was he was in total control (we were 7 hours away) so had to learn how to handle it on his own. We were fortunate a hospital was nearby his dorm (he had to go to the ER once which resulted in a week hospitalization) and he picked up his prescriptions there. Good luck to your student!!!
One other thing. I wrote letters myself for MD’s to sign, with the diagnosis, the accomodations needed and the reasons. My daughter has other health problems (which further argued, in her case, for a single room) and I wrote a letter for each MD specialist. The MD’s were grateful (not offended) to just have to sign, rather than write, the letters. Honestly, accommodations are often not their area of expertise 
The Internet offers many resources for figuring out the accommodations that might be helpful.
It must be hard to have a child diagnosed duriing college. Mine was diagnosed at 4, so at least that is all she knows. If they cured type1 (not expecting this) she would still test her blood sugar!!
My daughter dragged her heels on getting a CGM. Within weeks she cannot live without it. It has made a HUGE difference.
Compmom, my son doesn’t have a CGM. When he got his pump a couple of months after his diagnosis, he didn’t push for a CGM because he was so skinny he didn’t feel he had any place to put it. It is 4 years later and I think it would be great but he doesn’t think he needs it. He says he feels when he is low, and he will get one when can’t tell anymore. I am sure it would make a huge difference in keeping his sugars more level though.
My daughter is skinny too. It’s a lot of insertions, but the CGM wire is tiny.
He is still relatively new to things. He knows that control involves a lot more than feeling lows, and if he wants better control the technology is there if and when he wants it
In the meantime, safety is a priority, and he seems to feel safe. However, if he has a lot of lows in a short span of time, he may feel his lows less. My daughter is finding that with the better control and HgA1C she is getting with the CGM she actually doesn’t feel lows as much. With higher blood sugars, they are easier to feel because a low is a bigger change from norm.
This is a drawback to better control, making the CGM’s alarms indispensable at this point, unless she ran higher again.