I use an insulin pump to care for my diabetes and I’ve found that I need to stay away from skin that has stretch marks. I think skin with stretch marks was possibly the reason for when I had a bent cannula. A couple of times when I had site failure issues, I noticed that the nearby skin had stretch marks.

I also recently read the medical insert that comes with my Humalog, and it specifically says to avoid injecting insulin into skin with stretch marks. Medtronic also mentions this on their website.

When considering where to inject insulin or insert an infusion set, stay away from areas with stretch marks. Now, I carefully look at the skin and make sure that it doesn’t have any scars of stretch marks.

Personally, the stretch marks are from losing weight. Weight loss is a common symptom of diabetes (specifically LADA and Type 1) so I would imagine that having stretch marks is a super common thing. Stretch marks can also be from pregnancy.

Related Links

• Infusion Set Insertion Locations – Medtronic
• Scar Tissue/Stretch Marks – Diabetes Daily Forum
• What are the best insulin injection sites? – Medical News Today