Diabetes in the News
Welcome to “Diabetes in the News”. This feature has links to diabetes related news stories, blogs, or websites. If you come upon a story, blog or website that I haven’t mentioned, e-mail me at joscafe.com at gmail.com. I will check it out and if posted, give credit where credit is due.
Insulin in a Pill?
Why don’t we have insulin in a pill? Because the stomach digests it before it gets into the bloodstream. Pharmaceutical companies have long been working to overcome this barrier, but until now, the little bit that made it into the bloodstream was insufficient to make a difference. Until now… maybe, hopefully! Clinical trial results on a new insulin pill called Intesulin have just been released showing that it is 60-70% as effective as injected insulin. It lowered glucose levels comparably, and kept those levels steady for patients throughout the day.
Type 2 Diabetes Epidemic Spreads to India, China, Africa
Earlier this month, Time magazine had an interesting article about the spread of Type 2 diabetes to other parts of the world: “On the fifth floor of a fading pink-and-green building in New Delhi, Dr. Ashok Jhingan is waging a desperate battle against a relentless medical foe. In an office that’s only a few degrees cooler than the sweltering city outside, Jhingan and his small team of doctors are tackling what could be India’s biggest emerging health problem. No, it’s not aids or cholera or malaria, each of which is tragically entrenched among the country’s 1 billion people.
Sugar monitor gets kids involved in diabetes care
A monitor that continuously measures body sugar levels is feasible for home use, safe, and accurate, researchers report. A serendipitous finding was that the children tend to become very involved in their own diabetes management.
A number of studies from the Diabetes Research in Children Network (DirecNet) Study Group were presented here throughout the course of the 66th Scientific Sessions of the American Diabetes Association.
Stanford University’s DirecNet director Dr. Bruce Buckingham presented results of continuous monitoring using the Freestyle Navigator Continuous Monitoring System (Abbott Diabetes Care, Alameda, CA) in 30 children, ranging in age from 4 years to 17 years, with an average age of 11 years.
The continuous monitoring device has a sensor, which penetrates the skin a few millimeters, and is changed every five days. Children in the study wore the device at home for 13 weeks. They were contacted about once a week by a healthcare provider.
New Type 2 diabetes drugs at FDA stage
Merck & Co. and Novartis AG are seeking U.S. government approval of new Type 2 diabetes drugs they claim have milder side effects than current treatments. As Type 2 diabetes cases increase, the two drugmakers say Food and Drug Administration approval will help sufferers cut blood sugar without increasing their weight or retaining fluid. Type 2 diabetes occurs in overweight people and has recently begun appearing more in children. It is preventable and treatable. The Wall Street Journal reports the companies will also cash in on the DPP-IV inhibitors as analysts estimate an annual sale of $1 billion by 2010.
Average American Has Very High Risk of Diabetes
Body mass index (BMI), the ratio of body weight to height, is tightly linked to lifetime risk of diabetes mellitus, researchers reported at the Scientific Sessions of the American Diabetes Association. “On average, every American has a very high risk of diabetes,” CDC investigators told conference participants.
Using the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) data, Dr. K. M. Venkat Narayan and associates at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, calculated the lifetime risk of diabetes according to BMI for subjects between 18 and 84 years old. A BMI between 20 and 25 is considered normal, whereas values above or below this range represent being under- and overweight, respectively. Obesity is typically defined as a BMI of 30 or greater. For a normal-weight 18-year-old man, the average lifetime risk of diabetes is 19.8 percent. The risk increases to 29.7 percent for overweight men, 57.0 percent for obese men and 70.3 percent for very obese men. For normal-weight women at 18 years of age, the lifetime risk is 17.1 percent; for overweight women it is 35.4 percent, for obese women it is 54.6 percent and for very obese women it is 74.4 percent.
“Clearly, intervening to reduce obesity as early in life as possible is our best tool to reduce the risk of diabetes,” Narayan told meeting attendees.
Additional Reading
Living with diabetes: Half of those with the disease don’t even know they have it
Diabetics Not Getting Adequate Treatment, Specialists Contend
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Jo’s Diabetes Links here.
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