Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Allen on July 21, 2011 at 7:53am

Lithium batteries last a long time but they seem to die quickly. When I see two bars remaining I generally will get a couple of days more and I change everything including the battery when it is time to change syringes and insets.

Permalink Reply by DianaS on July 21, 2011 at 1:38pm

This has been my experience too. If you watch the battery icon on the pump screen it can go quite a while on two bars but as soon as it drops to one the lithium battery isn't going to last long at all in my experience. If I've gone more than two set changes with two bars on the pump battery icon I'll try and remember to just change the battery at the next set change as mine typically won't last much longer than that as I use the remote a lot.

If you end up changing the battery during set changes you don't have to change the reservoir but you do have to rewind and prime again. You'll also lose IOB if you change the battery while there's insulin on board.

I keep a spare battery in my meter case because I've actually had the pump die on me because I thought I had more time after a low battery alarm to change it. Live and learn.

Permalink Reply by Dude on July 21, 2011 at 4:12pm

Thank you all so much for the input and advice! From now on I'll always have a spare battery with me at all times.

Permalink Reply by Ernie on July 24, 2011 at 8:54pm

YEAH make sure you have a spare on you at all times, even if it sits in the bottom of the book bag, YOU do not want to get caught with a dead pump, I did that once and I WILL never NOT carry a spare battery!

Permalink Reply by Dude on July 25, 2011 at 3:43am

Does the Pump give you any other indications that it is going to die AFTER you get the low battery warning? Some of you have said you us it until it dies. Does it beep or anything right before it finally gives out on that battery?

Permalink Reply by DianaS on July 25, 2011 at 10:12am

In my experience no. I don't think there's enough juice left in the battery to allow it to do anything after it gets to that point. It's the one drawback to using lithium. But since it lasts so much longer than the alkaline it's worth while for me. With an alkaline battery I'll have a little longer between low battery warning and dead pump but I'm changing those more often which is also annoying. I really like the lithium.

Permalink Reply by kphil06 on July 29, 2011 at 7:34pm

mine does the same exact thing. The first two times my battery died I had to change my sets anyways, so I just did it all as one. Last time, I had 2 days left, so I just disconnected and did a new series of prime/rewind with the same cartridge and that worked fine. The little bugger will not shut up until you change that battery! I think it would last longer without all the warnings! (but then I would surely forget to change it...)

Permalink Reply by amby6063 on September 15, 2011 at 12:05am

I'm actually kind of unhappy with the battery on my ping... I don't want to retype so this is copied from my blog:

I had a little bit of a battery issue with my pump over the weekend... My battery was showing as completely full until late Friday afternoon, when it dropped to 2/3's. I figured I'd get about another 5 days out of it and didn't think anything of it. On Saturday after we got in around 10:45 my pump all of the sudden alarmed and said that the battery was low and to change now. I figured it was just getting a little ahead of itself and decided I'd deal with it the next day. I mean it had JUST gone to 2/3, surely I'd be able to get a few more days out of it. Not the case, Jamie woke me up at 3:30 because my pump was alarming its face off. Luckily he's a light sleeper because there is no way that would wake me up. Anyways, in a sleepy stupor I tried seeing what was going on with the silly thing and the screen is BLACK. I can't touch anything, and the alarm will NOT shut up. I don't know if my basal was still continuing or what. I went downstairs and changed out the battery (thank god I had some double A's sitting around!) and went back to bed, none too pleased. I got 4 weeks out of the battery, so that's not a big problem, but I really do not like that it just died within 36 hours, when it had been showing as completely full. My meter remote is a little bit sketchy too. The battery was showing as 2/3 on some screens and fully charged on some other screens. It started giving me 'change battery' messages, which I ignored initially because the screens still showed as fully charged. After getting the message 3 times (and still getting 2/3 or 3/3 on the screens) I bit the bullet and changed the batteries. I got the change battery screen about 4 hours after changing them, so I have no idea why that came up, as they are brand new batteries. Since then everything looks okay, but I am not happy with these battery issues. I'll see how it goes with what's in there right now and if it drops drastically again, I'm calling tech support. What if I wasn't home? It only gave me 3 hours before my pump was completly 100% not responding at all dead. That is unbelievable, and pretty dangerous if you ask me.


Not pretty happy with that! A little warning would have been nice.. I hadn't bought any lithium batteries yet, because I figured I'd have a couple days notice.

Permalink Reply by DianaS on September 15, 2011 at 11:44am

No that's the one thing about the Animas when you get once you start getting the low battery icons/draining it drains really fast. I learned to never ignore a change battery message. I keep a spare battery with me at all times. If I get a low battery warning in the early part of the night I get up and put in a new battery otherwise the pump may be dead by morning. If I'm down to my last battery icon on the pump I'll try and remember to change the battery with the next set change too.

Took a little getting used to at first especially when I was temporarily using alkalines which typically last less than a week. With the lithium batteries I'm getting 4 to 6 weeks per battery and I use the remote all the time to bolus plus my pump is usually set to vibrate so I'm a big battery drainer too. I've found that Engergizers last much longer than any other brand of battery also in the Animas pump for me.

I did have one instance where the pump powered off without a low battery warning and they replaced it because they thought the battery interface was faulty. The only time I've had the low battery message come up immediately after changing the batteries the problem was the batteries (I was at my parents and they were old) not the pump. It's certainly worth a call if it persists though.

I also find the meter remote goes through batteries faster than a typical meter does but I don't mind and I don't think it's excessive given that I bolus with the remote all the time. Like the pump it just took me a little bit to get used to.

Permalink Reply by SF_PingPump on October 9, 2011 at 12:46pm

I am new to the Animas OneTouch Ping pump and just got my first Low Battery warning message with two bars on the battery indicator on the Home screen of the pump. The first Low Battery message was on Friday (10/7/2011) at 8:10AM. The same battery is still in and it is Sunday (10/9/2011) at 12:45PM.

I called Animas support to ask why would I get this message after only 4 weeks of using the pump

I was told you "wake up" the pump frequently to use the menus and features, you drain the battery a little quicker. This makes sense to me, and one battery every 4 weeks does not seem bad to me.

I didn't ask how long it will run on the low battery indicator, but it has been more than 24 hours. The battery indicator on the pump has been alternating from 2 bars to 1 bar back to 2 for the last 24 hours. I have a replacement battery ready to go. The manual says the pump has a minimum of 3 hours when on Low Battery (and the Replace Battery message indicates a minimum of 3 minutes). A minimum amount of time does not tell me the maximum or most amount of time you have.

Based on prior postings, I get the feeling the battery indicator seems to work differently for people. It would be helpful to know that the Low Battery notification goes for a week (although it is a little annoying) before the battery kicks out.

I would be curious to know how long others have run the pump with the Low Battery notification.

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