Here’s a bunch of diverse T1 tech and meds updates!
Diabetes Orgs Demand Evaluation of Insulin Quality, from InsulinNation.com on 11 April 2018, stating that JDRF, ADA, and Helmsley have issued RFP’s to research consistency and potency of insulin in U.S. pharmacies. Just when you thought your insulin was consistently potent across all pharmacies!
The RFP was prompted by a small study published in December 2017 that found wide variation in the level of activity in insulin purchased in U.S. pharmacies. The previous report (which was not initiated by JDRF, ADA or Helmsley) prompted concern among insulin users and controversy among manufacturers, clinicians and biochemists. Its results were surprising in that they were inconsistent with data from previous regulatory audits, highlighting the need for further study.
The December study, published in the Journal of Diabetes Science and Technology, examined 18 10-mL vials of NPH and regular insulin produced by two major manufacturers and randomly purchased in U.S. pharmacies. It found an average dosage of 40.2 U/mL with levels ranging from 13.9 to 94.2 U/mL. None of the vials met the 95-U/mL standard at the time of testing. The U.S. Pharmacopeia and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration require insulin vials and cartridges to contain a minimum of 95 percent intact insulin (95 U/mL).
The work requested in the RFP consists of establishing a protocol for the project, analyzing the activity of insulin in vials and cartridges, and submitting a paper on the outcomes of the study to a peer-reviewed journal.
Read more: Diabetes Orgs Demand Evaluation of Insulin Quality
Novo Nordisk Foundation Lecture awarded to researcher with a new take on the cause of type 1 diabetes, reported on the NovoNordiskFonden.dk/en/com site, 13 April 2018.
A pancreas from a dead organ donor gave rise to a completely new theory on what causes type 1 diabetes. Olle Korsgren, Professor of Transplant Immunology, and his colleagues at Uppsala University Hospital decided to take the opportunity to examine the donor’s pancreas. They discovered something surprising.
“We noticed a type of inflammation in several lobes in the pancreas. This made us consider whether type 1 diabetes may have other causes than the one we have learned from animal models: whether another mechanism could be present rather than T cells attacking beta cells,” explains Olle Korsgren.
Exocrine tissue, which comprises 99% of a pancreas, produces the digestive enzymes that are transmitted through channels into the digestive system. The remaining 1% is endocrine tissue, which is spread like small islets of cells throughout the pancreas. Slightly more than half these cells are beta cells, which produce insulin. These beta cells are especially damaged when a person has type 1 diabetes. Until a few years ago, type 1 diabetes was thought to be an autoimmune disease in which the body’s own defence mechanism mistakenly attacks its own beta cells. However, it has become increasingly evident instead that type 1 diabetes may be a type of chronic inflammation of the pancreas.
Senators Probe ‘Enormous’ Insulin Price Spikes was reported by Joyce Frieden on MedPageToday, 8 May 2018.
Congress needs to find out what is causing the price of insulin to rise so high, several senators said at a Senate Aging Committee hearing on the subject.
“The manufacturers all claim that they’re not benefiting from increases in price, and that their net price is approximately the same, yet we see this enormous tripling … in the cost of insulin,” said committee chairman Susan Collins (R-Maine). “So what’s going on here? Who’s making the money that’s causing these enormous price increases, and are manufacturers correct when they say, ‘We’re not the ones; our net price is relatively stable over time’?”
Read more: Senators Probe ‘Enormous’ Insulin Price Spikes
First Look at Lilly’s Automated Insulin Delivery System was shared by Jeemin Kwon and Brian Levine on diaTribe.org, 4 May 2018.
Lilly Diabetes showed a prototype of their new, disk-like pump, with will integrate with Dexcom G6 CGM in a hybrid-closed loop system (AID = Automated Insulin Delivery system).
T
he system will consist of a custom disk-shaped pump, Dexcom G6 CGM, and an algorithm that adjusts basal insulin delivery every five minutes to keep glucose in range. The system is expected to launch in 2-3 years. Sorry, no pictures available yet!
Read more: First Look at Lilly’s Automated Insulin Delivery System
Type 1 diabetes is no longer considered an autoimmune disease? If true, that is HUGE. Am I the first who hasn’t heard this till now? The implications of this discovery on future treatments for T1D are exciting!
I am not completely sold on the concept of T1 being other than an autoimmune condition and I do not think that the scientists are saying it is not. Inflammation occurs in dozens of parts of the human body and is caused at least in part by many autoimmune diseases. Might it be a breakthrough? Perhaps or perhaps a blind alley. I for one have signed up for the pancreas donor network to help answer this and dozens of other questions.