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Saturday, December 16 2006 @ 05:47 PM Central Standard Time
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 US and Canadian scientists have successfully healed a diabetic mice overnight, according to Dr. Hans Michael Dosch of the University Toronto.
They have found out that defective nerve cells in the pancreas might be the cause of type-1 diabetes in mice. The current research is a breakthrough considering its possible implications to treatment of human diabetes. Currently, there has been no known way of preventing Type-1 diabetes. This disease, once called juvenile diabetes, has been recorded to affect two million Americans and 200,000 Canadians.
The results of the experimentation on mice with type-1 diabetes showed that defective nerve endings may attract immune system proteins that mistakenly attack the pancreas. The destruction destroys the body’s ability to make insulin and this is the cause of diabetes.
In order to cure diabetic mice, they injected a piece of protein, or peptide, in order to provide the proteins needed to keep insulin flowing. Dosch and his other colleagues wrote in an article in the journal, Cell. They said that faulty nerve endings fail to secrete peptides and that is why it needs to be injected.
"It is very effective in reversing diabetes," said Dosch, principal investigator for the study.
Soon, the team will be doing clinical studies on people whose family histories indicate a high probability of developing type-1 diabetes. In these studies, they will see if the sensory nerves of these people work well.
If the studies will confirm the existence of defective sensory nerves on these people, then it will show that the defects might not be an effect of diabetes but more of a cause of it.
Dosch said that as in the case of mice, if proven, then they might start injecting peptides to diabetic people or those at high risk of getting it.
Although the results were not as strong in the case of type-2 diabetes, Dosch and his team are hopeful.
"Whether we can reverse the process, I don't know. But I think we can certainly impact on the major physiological problem, and that's insulin sensitivity," Dosch said.
Type 2 diabetic people are often obese. It might be able to prevent obesity and damage from diabetes by lowering insulin resistance
Peptide injections have been found to lower resistance to insulin.
Ma. Roma C. Agsalud
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