Free Diabetic Supplies

There continue to be new inventions and ideas in the fight against diabetes.  There is a new discovery that could all but eliminate type 1 diabetes for some young people who have it.

Researchers at the University of Virginia along with researchers at various places around the world to see whether a computerized artificial pancreas that could change the way type 1 diabetes is treated and controlled.

Several clinical trials on the artificial pancreas have already been completed throughout the world.  The University of Virginia has completed its first trial with incredible results.  This individually prescribed controlled algorithm regulates blood sugar levels in type 1 diabetes.  There are seven research centers world wide and they are funded for these trials by the Juvenile Diabetes Foundation.
Starting late in June, researchers have been successful in using the new system to test five patients at the University of Virginia Health System. Three additional patients participated in parallel tests at the University of Padova, Italy.

“Our initial results are very encouraging,” said Boris Kovatchev, associate professor of psychiatry and neurobehavioral sciences and of systems and information engineering, who is leading the University of Virginia research team. “The system entirely maintained the patients’ blood glucose levels, and the algorithm achieved excellent overnight control without any incidence of hypoglycemia.”  Kovatchev is one of the world’s foremost experts on individualized diabetes research.

Another positive event regarding these tests is that the Food and Drug Administration provided its approval to test the artificial pancreas in humans without performing animal trials in advance.  Permission for the tests was based solely on computer simulation experiments. As a result, instead of the tests taking about 7 years, they took only 6 months.

“This artificial pancreas could one day greatly improve the current methods of self-treatment for Type 1 diabetes,” Kovatchev said. “Instead of a patient having to measure his or her blood sugar with a glucose meter several times a day and self-administer insulin injections, this system would continuously regulate the patient’s blood glucose, much like the way a non-diabetic’s pancreas functions.”

The results from the tests at University of Virginia, and centers in France and Italy should be available by early 2009.