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Though theories abound, scientists still don't understand what is causing the rise in type 1 diabetes in children worldwide. The incidence of type 1 diabetes in children is on the rise worldwide, with the number of new cases growing by an average of 3% per year in youth under age 15. The reasons for the sharp increase remain a medical mystery, since researchers have not been able to identify the changing conditions that are causing more kids to be diagnosed in recent decades. A new study presented this week at the annual Society for Endocrinology conference may help shed more light...

Diabetes is a detrimental disease. In order to combat the illness, University of British Columbia (UBC) researchers conducted a study with an industry partner and discovered that stem cells can reverse Type 1 diabetes in mice. The discovery leads the way for the development of innovative treatments of diabetes, which is caused by deficient production of insulin by the pancreas. Insulin allows glucose to be held by the bodyÂ’s muscle, fat, and liver; in turn, itÂ’s used as fuel for the body. Blindness, heart attack, kidney failure, nerve damage, and stroke are possible consequences of low insulin production. The research...

A study led by researchers from the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine has found a correlation between vitamin D3 serum levels and subsequent incidence of Type 1 diabetes. The six-year study of blood levels of nearly 2,000 individuals suggests a preventive role for vitamin D3 in this disease. The research appears the December issue of Diabetologia, a publication of the European Association for the Study of Diabetes (EASD). "Previous studies proposed the existence of an association between vitamin D deficiency and risk of and Type 1 diabetes, but this is the first time that the theory has...

CAPE GIRARDEAU, MO (KFVS) - Recent data shows a shocking jump in youth diabetes. A new study in the Journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics said 1 out of 4 youth in the U.S. is diabetic or pre-diabetic. The study looked at kids under 20 years old. It showed between 2000 and 2008, the percentage of teens with pre-diabetes and diabetes jumped from nine to 23 percent. Local Diabetes Educator Janet Stewart at Southeast Health said in the past decade she's seen the number of kids with Type 1 or Type 2 diabetes jump almost 30 percent. She said...

Killer T-cells in the human body which help protect us from disease can inadvertently destroy cells that produce insulin, new research has uncovered. The study provides the first evidence of this mechanism in action and could offer new understanding of the cause of Type 1 diabetes. Professor Andy Sewell, an expert in human T-cells from Cardiff University's School of Medicine worked alongside diabetes experts from King's College London to better understand the role of T-cells in the development of Type 1 diabetes. The team isolated a T-cell from a patient with Type 1 diabetes to view a unique molecular interaction...

A chemical produced by the same cells that make insulin in the pancreas prevented and even reversed Type 1 diabetes in mice, researchers at St. Michael’s Hospital have found. Type 1 diabetes, formerly known as juvenile diabetes, is characterized by the immune system’s destruction of the beta cells in the pancreas that make and secrete insulin. As a result, the body makes little or no insulin. The only conventional treatment for Type 1 diabetes is insulin injection, but insulin is not a cure as it does not prevent or reverse the loss of beta cells. A team led by Dr....

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) – How many carbs you eat might be less important for your blood sugar than your food's glycemic load, a measure that also takes into account how quickly you absorb those carbs. That's the conclusion of a new study of healthy adults, which questions the way people with type 1 diabetes determine how much insulin they should take before meals. In type 1 diabetes, which affects about 3 million Americans, the pancreas doesn't produce sufficient amounts of the hormone insulin, which helps ferry sugar from the blood into cells. So people with the disease are quickly...

Differences in the sequence of a single gene may be partly responsible for causing around 2% of relatively common autoimmune disorders including diabetes and arthritis. The gene codes for an enzyme called sialic acid acetylesterase (SIAE) that regulates the immune system's B cells — the cells responsible for producing antibodies against foreign invaders. In 24 of 923 people with conditions such as Crohn's disease, type 1 diabetes, rheumatoid arthritis, systemic lupus erythematosus and multiple sclerosis, the gene was present in a variant form. For the past five years, genome-wide screens of large groups of patients have searched for commonly occurring...

Patients with diabetic nephropathy, kidney disease caused by diabetes and treated with high doses of vitamin B, suffered rapid deterioration of the kidneys, a recent study has found. Diabetics in addition to kidney function loss also were affected by higher rates of heart attack and stroke than those who took a placebo, according to the clinical research in the April 28 edition of the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA). Diabetic nephropathy affects the network of tiny blood vessels in the glomerulus, a structure in the kidney made of capillary blood vessels, which is needed to filter blood. Despite...

Insulin-producing cells can regenerate in diabetic mice Discovery suggests potential treatment strategy for type 1 diabetes Replacements for some diabetics’ missing insulin-producing cells might be found in the patients’ own pancreases, a new study in mice suggests. Alpha cells in the pancreas can spontaneously transform into insulin-producing beta cells, researchers from the University of Geneva in Switzerland report online in Nature April 4. The study, done in mice, is the first to reveal the pancreas’s ability to regenerate missing cells. Scientists were surprised to find that new beta cells arose from alpha cells in the pancreas, rather than stem cells....

Researchers find self-regulating feature of immune system Weakness can be a strength when it comes to keeping the immune system from attacking the body’s own cells, mouse experiments that use a new vaccine against type 1 diabetes reveal. The new research, published online April 8 in Immunity, describes previously unknown cells that keep the immune system in check. The study demonstrates that the immune system is already outfitted with tools that can defuse destructive autoimmune reactions without damaging the body’s ability to fight infections. And it suggests that harnessing those tools may be a successful strategy for developing a vaccine...

In 1922, a Toronto teenager with diabetes became the first person to be saved by insulin treatment, and since then injections have sustained millions of diabetics, who don’t make their own hormone. But are there alternatives to a lifetime of insulin therapy? A new study suggests that an appetite-suppressing hormone called leptin is just as effective as insulin at controlling diabetes in mice. The discovery of insulin transformed type 1 diabetes from a fatal to a chronic disease. In this type of diabetes, the body destroys insulin-producing cells in the pancreas, resulting in high blood glucose levels. (The more common...

'Artificial pancreas' could remove multiple daily finger prick tests for children with type 1 diabetes An artificial pancreas system being developed by scientists at Cambridge in the UK could help safely manage type 1 diabetes in children. The new system combines a commercially available continuous glucose monitor and an insulin pump, and uses a sophisticated algorithm which calculates the correct amount of insulin to deliver based on real-time glucose readings. The research team found that using an artificial pancreas system overnight can significantly reduce the risk of hypoglycemia, or "hypos", when blood glucose levels drop dangerously low, while sleeping. "Hypos"...

A natural glue that sticks mussels to rocks and boat hulls has inspired US scientists to develop a new type of medical adhesive for use in pancreatic islet transplantation, an experimental medical procedure for treating patients with type 1 diabetes. The glue, developed by Phillip Messersmith's team at Northwestern University in Evanston, consists of a branched poly(ethylene glycol) core with catechol-derived end groups. Speaking at the Materials Research Society's meeting in Boston last week, Messersmith explained that the catechol functional group plays a key role in the solidification and adhesive capabilities of the marine blue mussel Mytilus edulis' adhesive proteins. 'Catechol in the presence of an...

Researchers are inching ever closer to bringing the latest stem-cell technologies from bench to bedside — and are, in the process, learning more about some diseases that long have remained medical black boxes. This week, scientists at the Harvard Stem Cell Institute (HSCI) reported the first success in generating new populations of insulin-producing cells using skin cells of Type 1 diabetes patients. The achievement involved the newer embryo-free technique for generating stem cells, and marked the first step toward building a treatment that could one day replace a patient's faulty insulin-making cells with healthy, functioning ones. (See the top 10...

Last week, a team of eight cyclists completed the coast-to-coast bike marathon called the Race Across America in record time. It was quite an achievement under any circumstances, but what made it extraordinary was something all eight of them had in common: Type 1 diabetes. Type 1, sometimes called juvenile diabetes, poses special challenges for athletes. A person with Type 1 can’t produce insulin and must take regular injections to control blood sugar. But exercise can also lead to precipitous, even deadly, drops in blood sugar. (Type 2 diabetes, by far the more common form of the disease, typically develops...

WASHINGTON: Harold Hamm Oklahoma Diabetes Center researchers have found a link between taking vitamin C with insulin and stopping blood vessel damage caused by type 1 diabetes. While neither therapy produced desired results when used alone, the combination of insulin to control blood sugar together with the use of Vitamin C, stopped blood vessel damage caused by the disease in patients with poor glucose control, said researchers. The findings appear this week in the Journal of Clinical Endocrinology and Metabolism. "We had tested this theory on research models, but this is the first time anyone has shown the therapy's effectiveness...

Enlarge ImageMystery disease. Scientists monitor a narcoleptic patient. Credit: Donna E. Natale Planas/Miami Herald/MCT/Newscom The millions of people who suffer from narcolepsy might have their immune system to blame. Researchers have tied the disabling sleep disorder to two immune system genes, suggesting that it's an autoimmune disease. The discovery may eventually lead to improved narcolepsy treatments. Narcolepsy affects 1 in every 2000 people, making it about as common as multiple sclerosis. The disorder encompasses an odd constellation of symptoms, including overwhelming daytime drowsiness, uncontrollable sleep attacks, and cataplexy, a sudden loss of muscle tone after an intense emotional outburst,...

Researchers have used injections of patients' own stem cells to reverse the course of type 1 diabetes, reports a research team from the University of São Paulo in Brazil and Northwestern University in Chicago. The findings, published in the current issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association, exemplify the remarkable gains made by diabetes researchers, who are battling a continuously spreading disease that now affects nearly 8% of adults and children. (See the top 10 medical breakthroughs of 2008.) The research team, led by Dr. Julio Voltarelli of the University of Sao Paulo, is the first to successfully...

Human parechovirus is a harmless virus which is encountered by most infants and displays few symptoms. Suspected of triggering type 1 diabetes in susceptible people, research methods need to take this "silent" virus into consideration. This comes from findings in a study from the Norwegian Institute of Public Health. This study was part of a long-term project at the Norwegian Institute of Public Health to investigate if environmental risk factors affect type 1 diabetes. Faecal samples and questionnaires about the health of 102 children were sent in monthly by their parents for closer study. Researchers wanted to see how common...