i have the Chrono, applied medical that supply the sof sets etc are the ones who supply the chrono, and all the staff there are very knowledgable,
they service mine for me as we bought it with a grant from girlguiding, when it went wrong they organised with the makers in italy to have a new one for me at no cost to me, i was very impressed with them, Ray is the Guy that does all the servicing.
i have two other chrono pumps for my immunoglobulins, they are a different colour, (blue|) but essentially the same, i really recomend them, and they cost only a little more than the old graseby.
I use the graseby too but the MS16A one. I get a replacement when the it goes off to be serviced. Have had no probs with hosp as they have lots of them spare and can get instant replacement if pump starts misbehaving.
Clare
Hey I use a chrono 30 which is pretty easy to use once you get used to it
It gets serviced by the hospital every year and they supply all the bits for it
Hey Kate,
Excuse the essay in advance!!
I'll go with George and wss's comments - have been using my crono for sc bricanyl since late 06 early 07? and am a big fan.
It's been fantastic. Always had very very good service from Ray at AMT, with loan pumps sent out when my pump was in for service. I think that practice my vary depending on if your pump is a private purchase, or a hospital one!
The pump itself is small enough to be hidden in a standard mobile phone case (even with syringe attached)-so is clipped to my belt loop with a tiny karabina, or hidden in a back jeans pocket - so people don't think you've got anything unusual on you; especially if you use the little wind-up thing that they market - that holds all your excess tubing to the belt or waist of your trousers. None of the using travel pouches under shirts or blouses, or in hoodie front pockets... or hiding your pump in a bag, and then forgetting you are attached to it, and walking off, ending up dragging it along the floor, pulling the subcut set out in the process - like I used to do every so often with my graesby.
I went down the crono route as at the time I was still able to work in the hospital, and my employers and I thought it not particularly best practice for me to be running around the wards with a graesby so visibly on show (either trying to [usually unsuccessfully] hide it under my blouse or in my work bag)- when really I needed it to be securely attached to me in order to do my job effectively. Also, I think there may have been a feeling that patients may get somewhat concerned as to my working abilities if it was seen - as the only patients who had them on the wards were usually those who needed them for the administration of palliative care medications - not asthma meds.
Anyway - a crono therefore was suggested for me, and I spent almost two years attached to it virtually 24/7, before changing to use it as I do now- just starting it as and when I need it. For a lot of that two years- my patients and many of my colleagues (except those who had the unfortunate honour of ending up treating me whenever I got ill...) had no idea I was connected to it, especially as the tremors reduced.
It is small enough to provide many other ways of wearing it compared to the graesby.... small enough to be easily strapped to the inner aspect of the front of the thigh if needing to hide it 'discretely' (imagine you were sitting on a chair with your legs knees together, it'd sit in the nook where your thighs meet -[ if that makes sense...?? ]- using the cloth pouch provided and some cloth tape ties or velcro. This enables it to be hidden beneath ball dresses and even relatively close fitting skirts and dresses....This allowed me to wear it for several junior doctors balls,mess parties and weddings etc without people knowing. Back then when I was able to work out in a gym, I also found it could fit under a baggy sleeve of a gym t-shirt being worn i-pod armband style (just under the sleeve for subtleness) if you are wanting to exercise in any form - or may just be of interest if you if you still site your s/c sets in your arms or upper chest.
It is much more user friendly than the graesby, more accurate - no more running thru ahead of schedule. Can be set to run a 10 or 20ml syringe through in a time between 1 and 99 hours, specifying to the nearest 15mins. The battery also lasts a lot longer. They are also SO quiet in comparison to the green brick!!
The downside is that it does use specific syringes, that have to be bought from AMT, so funding has to be approved from the trust for them, usually on a named patient basis - either via the district nurses and PCT (if you fill your own syringes-my current setup) or the hospital and pharmacy - (if syringes filled for you in aseptic supplies -my old set up - authorisation of which was a nightmare - as the pharmacy had to get compatibility and stability data from the company for the syringe material, to enable them to work out how long the syringes that they would prepare would last!)
Obviously the syringes are quite a lot more expensive than the normal luer lock 20ml syringes that most people would use on the graesby (and anything else in the hospital)... and therefore even if you were to want to self-purchase a crono...you can sometimes find financing the syringes/servicing can be an issue depending on where you live. AMT do a good servicing deal for those who are self purchasing/servicing, compared to what they charge the hospitals. The prices of the subcut (not the IV!) cronos themselves are pretty comparable to the graesbys, and bounds ahead in quality in my opinion... I'm certainly going to be looking into a replacement crono for this one when it needs it. I've had mine coming up for 4 years now, and its been serviced and a repair after I smashed the LCD screen in a bad fall.
I've also recently had other medical needs to require multiple medications subcut - that were incompatible in a mixed syringe - so at one point was using my crono for bricanyl, along with 2 graesbys.... that really drove it home quite how spectacularly different the two were!
Hope that helps a bit... please feel free to PM me etc if you have any questions....
am just going to look up the details of the more familiar looking brick like graesby replacement that I know some hospitals are using tho....
best wishes,
KSD
Hello! Me again!
(hopes you've not died of boredom reading my previous essay!)
I *believe* that RBH are using the McKinley T34 Ambulatory infusion pump as their replacement.... but its even BIGGER than the graesby!
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I use a chrono 30 which is pretty easy to use once you get used to it 
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