A Cure for Diabetes?

A Cure for Diabetes May be Close!

In the search for a cure for diabetes, a recent development has stunned even the experts involved. Scientists at a Toronto medical center claim that they have proof the the nerve system is responsible for triggering diabetes, a fact which may well lead to the possibility of a cure for the diabetes, an illness which causes problems for many millions in the affluent world.

Mice that had been given diabetes became healthy within 24 hours after medical experts introduced a compound to circumvent the effect of reduced neurons in the pancreas.

"I couldn’t believe it," reported Dr. Michael Salter, an expert in pain at the Hospital for Sick Children and one of the researchers involved in the discovery. "Mice with diabetes suddenly didn’t have diabetes any more." In essence, it appeared that this was a cure for their diabetes.

The specialists urge caution, warning that they still have to prove their study in humans, but say they expect results from human studies within a year or two. Any possible cure for diabetes that may develop is most likely to be years away from hitting the general public..

Having said that, the team from Sick Children, who published their research today in the well known journal ‘Cell’, are still immensely excited, and hope that this is a major step towards the cure for diabetes that the medical world has been seeking..

"I’ve never seen anything like it," stated Dr. Hans Michael Dosch, an expert in immunology the hospital and a leader of the studies.

Their research may overthrow the current view that Type 1 diabetes, the most serious form of the disorder that often occurs when the sufferer is still a child, was wholly brought on by auto-immune reactions, in other words, the patient’s immune system working against itself.

Their study also suggests that there is far more in common than previously thought between Type 1 and Type 2 diabetes, and that our nerves likely play a role in other irreversible inflammatory sicknesses, such as asthma and Crohn’s disease.

This impressive study opens "a novel, exciting door to address one of the diseases with large societal impact," said Doctor Christian Stohler, chair of the University of Maryland Department of Biologic and Materials Sciences and a well respected pain specialist, who has reviewed the ‘cure for diabetes’ claims.

Many millions have diabetes mellitus, with 10% having Type-one and 90% Type-two. The condition is the 6th most significant cause of death reported on U.S. death certificates, and many experts believe that it is even higher due to ‘under reporting’.

Diabetes is a disease in which the sufferers body doesn’t create or make correct use of insulin. Insulin is a hormone that is essential to transform glucose into energy needed for life. The causes of diabetes mellitus continues to be unknown, although both genetics and lifestyle factors such as obesity and absence of physical exercise are believed to play a role. At the present time, there is no known cure for diabetes.

The symptoms of diabetes are:

* The initial symptom of diabetes mellitus might be unusual thirst (unrelated to physical exercise, warm weather, or temporary ill health)
* Excessive hunger; (you are sure that you have consumed enough, however you still want more)
* Frequent urination, (commonly noticed because you have to wake repeatedly during the night)
* Feeling tired and feeling fatigued (often sudden enough to make you fall asleep unexpectedly after eating). This is one of the most frequently observed symptoms of diabetes).
* Sudden and unusual weight loss (any dramatic change in body weight is a message that you should visit your doctor)

Insulin injection is the only method of treating Type one diabetes, and even this doesn’t prevent many of the negative consequences, from heart attacks to kidney failure. It is not a cure for diabetes, merely a way of reducing some of the consequences and aiding longevity of the patient.

In the new research the team injected capsaicin, (the main active compound in chili peppers), into the pancreas in order to kill the pancreatic sensory nerves in lab mice that had Type one diabetes mellitus. The astonishing outcome was that the islets immediately began producing insulin at normal levels – in other words, it looked awfully like it was a cure for diabetes !

It turns out the nerves secrete neuropeptides that are a key factor in the correct functioning of the islets. Later research by the medical researchers, which involved the University of Calgary and the Jackson Laboratory in Maine, proved that the nerves in mice that had been given diabetes were secreting too few of the neuropeptides, causing a cycle of stress on the islets.

The researchers then injected a neuropeptide referred to as "substance p" in to the pancreas cells of diabetic rodents. the result was that the inflammation disappeared and the diabetes appeared to be cured. Some mice have remained in that state for 4 months or more, after only one dose.

The experts also found that this procedure reduced the insulin resistance that is the main distinguishing feature of Type-2 diabetes. This also seems to imply that insulin resistance is also a component part in Type-1 diabetes, which further suggests that the two types of diabetes are far more similar than previously thought.

The medical researchers are now trying to confirm that the connection between our nerves and diabetes holds true for people. If it does, they will see if their procedure has identically the same effect on humans as it did on laboratory mice.

Again, caution is urged – it is very early days and even if the research holds true any cure for diabetes will be years away. The best advice for all diabetics is to carry on with you diabetic care regimes exactly as normal.