• Font Size    

Featured Slideshows

2009 Celebrity Deaths, July-Dec.
E-mail

Close Window E-mail This Page

HealthWatch: Diabetes Research

Required fields are marked with an asterisk(*)

The information you provide will be used only to send the requested e-mail and will not be used to send any other e-mail communications. Read more in our Privacy Policy

Send E-mail

   Print     Share +   
Nov 18, 2008 6:50 am US/Eastern

HealthWatch: Diabetes Research

Reporting
Dr. Max Gomez
NEW YORK (CBS) ― Type-1 diabetes is a life-long battle to prevent the blindness, kidney failure and the amputations that can result, but recent research is generating new hope for a cure.

Mathias Salmon is a bright and active 7-year-old. He plays sports, goes to school in the second grade, but also has to check his blood sugar level a dozen times a day. "I have to test my number to see what number I am because if I'm in the 100s it's a good number," the Type-1 diabetes patient said.

To maintain his sugar level, Matty wears an insulin pump, watches what he eats and tests his blood a lot. And of course there's the constant vigilance of his parents Leslie and Ricardo. They know he is healthy now., but they also worry about the future.

"Our goal objective, I hope, is that one day he can be no longer insulin-dependent and there can be a cure," said his father, Ricardo Salmon.

The Salmons have pinned much their hopes for a cure on the Diabetes Research Institute at the University of Miami, where they're working on two major approaches. First is how to replace the lost beta cells in the pancreas.

One way is to transplant beta-cells from an organ donor pancreas. The trouble is, according to Dr. Camilo Ricordi of the Institute, "Even if you use all the donors that are available you may arrive to 6,000 a year and then you have millions that are on a waiting list so it will become like a lottery system."

That's why the DRI is trying to grow stem cells into an unlimited supply of insulin-producing cells. Another possibility being worked on is regenerating the beta cells with the patient's own cells. But even if there are enough cells to transplant or regenerate, "They will be destroyed again by the same immunne responses that started the disease in the very first place," said Dr. Luca Inverardi, also from the Institute.

So another research thrust is how to get the immune system to accept either the transplanted or regenerated cells, which would also eliminate the need for toxic immuno-suppressive drugs.
Which gives the Salmons this hope: "Mathias will not have to be dependent on insulin anymore and he won't have to think about whatever he eats and he'll be able to live a long and healthy life," Ricardo said.

(© MMIX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)

You need the latest Flash player to view video content.
Click here to download.

Click here to bypass this detection if you already have the latest Flash Player.

Top Stories

Top News Stories

© MMIX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.