A interesting piece of information fell across my path today and I’d like to share it.
SOME CELLS IN PANCREAS CAN SPONTANEOUSLY CHANGE INTO INSULIN-PRODUCING CELLS, DIABETES RESEARCHERS SHOW
YOU CAN FIND THIS HERE. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/04/100405091926.htm
This paper purports to look at possible cures for Type 1 diabetes but what was done seems very close to what happens to a KPD during sudden onset of DKA.
Researcher engineered mice to respond to a toxin that would destroy 99% of their beta cells inducing a sudden onset of DKA because these mice had essentially no beta cells left.What they found is that the pancreas would, without any further manipulations, grow new beta cells by using the alpha cells. If the mice were kept on insulin this process would continue until the pancreas would once again return to full functioning and the mice would no longer have diabetes.
Does this sound like anyone you know: sudden onset DKA, intensive insulin therapy and a return to near normal glycemic levels independent of insulin?
This gets better. Because of this blog, I have come in contact with quite a few KPD's, and (I might have mentioned this some where else in this blog) I've noted that many KPD's return to having very normal type numbers, hardly ever going over 100. What has seemed to be the case is that the ones who had DKA seemed to have better numbers than those who caught the process early, like me.
The researchers found that the destruction of beta cells had to exceed 95% to get the significant rebound back to glycemic normalcy.
People, we might have caught the break we have been looking for. Researchers are looking at this experiment as a significant breakthrough in the understanding of diabetes but this was done in mice. Typically, mice studies, if the ever prove out, take years before the lessons learned result in any type of treatment. Here we might very well have the process that they are looking at as the key to solving diabetes.
Mike