My electric feeding pump (Kangaroo Control) can be set from 1 to 500 ml/hr; 500 would be two cans/hr @ 250 ml/can. Certainly, I can hand pump faster than that; even gravity flow faster, but I have to concentrate on what I am doing -- With the pump, I can read, watch TV or even sleep while the flow keeps happening -- Given my left wrist is a little torn up, the pump is right for me.

When I had a big diameter PEG with my radiation, I was able to gravity feed the can into the syringe and occasionally pump it by hand if I was in a hurry. With this smaller tube, gravity doesn't work except occasionally for plain water; pumping at the same rate as before, about four-five syringe-strokes to the can, perhaps a little slower because more effort, was not acceptable to my gut -- I would get incredible rumbling quickly followed by throne time.

I suspect Medicare won't pay for the VHC 2.25 cal/ml because it isn't pumpable (I'd bet it would have with my old "big pipe" PEG), so it looks like the 2.0 cl/ml stuf is a good compromise (tube or drink).

I tried tasting either the Novartis Fibersource HN 1.2 cal/ml or the Ross-Abbott Osmolite 1.2 cal/ml and it was definitely not intended for drinking. BTW, Ensure, Boost and the Safeway generic are all made by Abbott.

When I first tried the food pump, I set it on 300 ml/hr, which was slightly slower than syringe pumping, but had the same problems. The dietitian said to cut it back to 100 ml/hr, which was much slower than it had ever been, but the problems went away. I have now slowly moved up to 150 ml/hr and all is still well. Now I am using the Nestle Nutren 2.0 cal/ml to get more total calories per can.

David is giving financial advice from the heart when he says "Free is always better..." <grinz> He's still busy, however, looking for stray bank accounts and auto registrations!