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Drug Stops Type 1 Diabetes in Its Tracks
bhaloo
05/30/02 at 20:58:55
[slm]

Drug Stops Type 1 Diabetes in Its Tracks
http://content.health.msn.com/content/article/1667.54109

Reduces Need for Insulin Shots, Improves Blood Sugar
By   Laurie Barclay  

May 29, 2002 - -- In a dramatic finding that may someday improve treatment for all types of diabetes, a new high-tech drug is stopping type 1 diabetes in people newly diagnosed with the disease -- decreasing their need for insulin shots. Until now, no treatment has been able to stop the downhill progression of the disease.


After taking the experimental drug for just two weeks, nine of 12 diabetics were able to decrease their need for insulin shots, and with very few side effects.


"The most important implication of this research is that we can intervene in type I diabetes after onset and still have an impact," senior researcher Jeffrey A. Bluestone, PhD, director of the UCSF Diabetes Center, tells WebMD. "This opens up the door to a whole host of other approaches, not just this drug."


Bluestone has filed a patent application for this new drug and has a commercial agreement regarding its use with Centocor and Johnson & Johnson Pharmaceuticals. Before it can be made available to the public, the drug will require many more years of study to confirm that it works as well as it seems and to be sure there are no hidden problems.


In type 1 diabetes, the immune system, which normally protects against foreign invaders, destroys specialized pancreas cells, beta cells, which produce insulin. Over the years, high blood sugar from diabetes can lead to early heart attacks and stroke, as well as blindness and kidney failure.


By targeting these specific immune cells, the new drug protects beta cells and preserves insulin production. The drug is an antibody that works against the destructive immune cells.


This damaging process actually starts years before a person develops symptoms from high blood sugar -- as insulin levels slowly fall in the body. But this drug brings us one step closer to treating the disease before symptoms appear, if we can identify early on those who will later develop type 1 diabetes, Bluestone says.


In the first human study, 12 people aged 7-27 with type 1 diabetes received daily injections of the new drug for two weeks. Patients began treatment within six weeks of being diagnosed with type 1 diabetes and reported only minor side effects.


The study is featured in the May 30 issue of The New England Journal of Medicine.


One year later, nine of the 12 patients were still producing the same amount of insulin. In fact, some were producing more insulin. This allowed them to decrease the amount of insulin shots they needed. In addition, blood sugar significantly improved.


However, 10 of 12 similar patients who did not receive the drug had a dramatic drop in natural insulin production, and they required higher doses of insulin than the treated patients.

No severe side effects were seen with the drug. The most common side effects were fever, rash, and anemia.


In an editorial accompanying the study, Edwin A.M. Gale, MD, calls the findings "encouraging" but cautions that further studies are needed. He is professor of diabetic medicine at the University of Bristol, England.


"The new treatment is very unlikely to avoid the need for insulin," Gale tells WebMD. "So why does it matter? Because it works in experimental animals even after the onset of diabetes, and practically nothing else does at this stage of the disease."


"Treatment with [this] antibody preserved insulin production in patients with new onset type 1 diabetes," lead researcher Kevan C. Herold, MD, tells WebMD.


"People with type 1 diabetes eventually lose their ability to make insulin entirely, and [those] who make some insulin have a much easier time controlling their disease than those who do not," he says. Herold is associate professor of clinical medicine at Columbia University College of Physicians & Surgeons.


Although other drugs that suppress immune function have stopped diabetes in its early stages before, the tradeoff has been widespread shutdown of the immune system. This leaves people vulnerable to life-threatening infections and cancer. Herold says these drugs are too dangerous to use in children, especially since they would have to be taken forever.


This new antibody is more of a silver bullet that specifically targets the immune cells causing diabetes without far-reaching effects on other body tissues. The researchers were able to accomplish this by combining certain parts of a human antibody with other parts of a mouse antibody.


In the near future, a large study involving more than 80 patients will use multiple doses to enhance the effects of the drug, much as repeated vaccinations increase protection against viral diseases.


An especially attractive feature of the new drug is that a single two-week treatment "seems able to re-educate the immune system permanently," Gale says. "If we get more conclusive evidence that it can produce lasting benefit after diagnosis, it might be feasible to use it before diagnosis."
Re: Drug Stops Type 1 Diabetes in Its Tracks
mwishka
06/01/02 at 19:30:14
bro bhaloo,

i'll check on this - haven't been reading anything but salt-bridge, folding, amyloid  - protein stuff  - lately.  but i can't get this journal on-line, i'm going to have to go to a library.  i'll let you know - but just to warn you, there have been at least three false alarms on miracle solutions to diabetes in about the last year.  and remember the gamma enzyme they were sure was an alzheimer's cure?  they rushed it through testing, sent it out to the public early, and started hurting people reeeeaaaaaal bad - i think some died.  they were messing with a cascade (consecutive and linked series of steps) in a metabolic process - just decided hey, this is the bad step, let's get rid of it.  whoopeeee!!!  the way medicine is practiced in the US......   seriously, i'll check on it and let you know - no promises when that'll be, except that it will be before i leave for palestine....

mwishka
Re: Drug Stops Type 1 Diabetes in Its Tracks
nouha
06/02/02 at 14:15:01
[slm]

thanks for the post bhaloo -- im a type 1 diabetic:)

wasalam
nouha:)


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