In order to treat one of man’s most pernicious diseases, researchers at Purdue University and Indiana University School of Medicine (IU) are collaborating with man’s best friend.
According to researchers, a new treatment has the potential to permanently reverse Type 1 diabetes in both people and dogs. (Photo courtesy of Kelly Prinkey-Krupinski).
This week, Purdue reported that researchers had successfully restored normal glucose levels in diabetic mice by administering an injection of a collagen solution containing pancreatic cells. Scientists report that it is the first minimally invasive treatment to successfully reverse Type 1 diabetes in 24 hours and maintain insulin independence for at least 90 days.
Researchers successfully ushered in healthy pancreatic cells using collagen, a protein the body already produces to help build muscles, bones, skin, and blood vessels.
The following step, according to Purdue University, is a pilot clinical study that will be carried out in conjunction with Purdue’s College of Veterinary Medicine on dogs who naturally have Type 1 diabetes.
“By first assisting dogs, we intend to account for differences between mice and humans.” With the help of the dogs, we can learn more about how well the therapy might function in people, explained Clarissa Hernandez Stephens, the study’s first author and a graduate student at Purdue’s Weldon School of Biomedical Engineering. In an upcoming issue of the American Journal of Physiology – Endocrinology and Metabolism, findings are already available in early view.
According to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), 30. 3 million people have diabetes, or some 9. 4% of the US population. The pancreas of people with type 1 diabetes produce either very little or no insulin. Without the hormone insulin, blood sugar is unable to enter your body’s cells where it can be used for energy and dangerously accumulates in the bloodstream.
About one in every 100 companion animals in the U.S. suffers from type 1 diabetes. S. , including dogs and cats, and approximately 1. 25 million American children and adults,” Purdue University reports. Because diabetes in dogs develops similarly to that in humans, treatment has thus far largely been the same: Both require constant glucose monitoring during the day and insulin administration after meals. ”.
Therefore, researchers believe that a new set of pancreatic cells to replace the clusters of cells, known as islets, that aren’t releasing insulin to monitor blood glucose levels could potentially benefit both dogs and humans.
48-year-old dog lover Kelly Prinkey-Krupinski has battled adult-onset Type 1 diabetes for 12 years. She said the disease runs her life. “It is a constant struggle,” she said. “My mind is constantly aware that every food bite, every medication I take, every illness, and every emotion I go through will have an impact on my blood sugar. The constant juggling act required to stay alive never takes a break. The idea of a time when I won’t be able to get the insulin I need to take all the time terrifies me. I would hope for a cure within my lifetime. Just thinking about the children who struggle with Type 1 diabetes makes me so sad. This research with dogs sounds promising. I love dogs and would love to see if there is a cure for them. Im excited to see the results. ”.
Because multiple donors are required, the current method of delivering islets through the portal vein of the liver is too invasive, and the human immune system tends to destroy a significant portion of transplanted islets, the university reports that 20 years of research and clinical trials have not resulted in an effective islet transplantation therapy.
So Purdue researchers changed how the islets were packaged. Instead of injecting them directly into the liver, they placed them in a collagen-containing solution and did so through the skin.
The skin doesn’t have the same blood flow that the liver does for transporting insulin released by islets, so traditionally, we only ever transplant islets in the animal’s liver. Raghu Mirmira, professor of pediatrics and medicine and director of the Diabetes Research Center at Indiana University School of Medicine, noted that because the skin contains a large number of immune cells, the likelihood of rejection is high.
Islet transplantation, according to the American Diabetes Association, can replace insulin injections and provide more physiological glucose control, but “there are not enough donor islets available for all the people who need them, and often it requires islets from several donors to transplant one recipient, exacerbating the donor shortage.” More than 80% of transplanted islets die within the first week after transplantation, which is a significant factor in the requirement for multiple donors. The surviving islets may overwork and gradually die from exhaustion. ”.
The University of California, San Francisco researcher Qizhi Tang, PhD, is researching the modifications brought on in beta cells by a lack of oxygen and nutrients. Due to inadequate oxygen and nutrient supplies, stem cell-derived islets have a low survival rate in the first few days after transplant. Nevertheless, according to the American Diabetes Association, “Evidence suggests that beta cells can be trained to survive the nutrient and oxygen shortages that they are exposed to both before and after transplantation.” ”.
In an article on its website, the American Diabetes Association claims that the promise of an unlimited source of beta cells from stem cell technology is likely to become a reality in the coming years. However, there are still obstacles to the widespread use of islet transplantation, including how to use this new source of cells, how these cells survive and function after transplantation, and how to best control immune responses against the transplanted tissue. The realization of the potential of stem cell-derived islets for the treatment of diabetes will depend on research in these fields. ”.
By combining mouse islets with the collagen solution, the Purdue and Indiana team eliminated the need for liver transplantation. As soon as the solution is injected just beneath the skin, it solidifies, and the body recognizes the collagen and supplies it with blood flow so that insulin and glucose can be exchanged.
You don’t need to go to the operating room to receive this infusion into the portal vein because it is minimally invasive. According to Sherry Voytik Harbin, a Purdue professor of biomedical engineering and basic medical sciences, “it’s as simple as it gets, just like getting a shot.”
Researchers will investigate the viability of transplanting pig islets or stem cells programmed to produce insulin in the hopes that either approach will further increase donor availability as they move from testing the formulation on mice to naturally diabetic dogs, the university reports.
Through the National Institute of Health T32 Indiana Bioengineering Interdisciplinary Training for Diabetes Research Program, Purdue and the IU School of Medicine collaborated on this patented work. Additionally, the research was funded by the McKinley Family Foundation, the Indiana University School of Medicine Center for Diabetes and Metabolic Diseases Pilot and Feasibility Program, and the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship.
While this is going on, American Diabetes Scientist Zhen Gu, PhD, a professor in the Joint Department of Biomedical Engineering at the Universities of North Carolina and North Carolina State, is developing a “smart insulin” patch that mimics the body’s beta cells by sensing blood glucose levels and releasing insulin using a nanotechnology that draws on bioengineering, biochemistry, and materials science.
More than 100 microneedles, each the size of an eyelash, are embedded in the thin silicon patch, which is roughly the size of a penny. According to the American Diabetes Association, “the microneedles are packed with enzymes that can sense blood glucose levels and trigger rapid release of insulin into the blood stream in response to high glucose.” “Dr. A mouse model of type 1 diabetes was used by Gu and his colleagues to test this technology, and they found that it could successfully lower blood glucose levels for up to nine hours. This is an encouraging finding that pave the way for further pre-clinical tests (in animals) and, hopefully, future clinical trials (in humans). ”.
The study was funded by a $1 million grant and published in the biomedical journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The American Diabetes Association’s Pathway to Stop Diabetes initiative has awarded a 625 million dollar grant.
Myth #1: Dogs and cats don’t get diabetes like people do.
Totally false. Unknown to many pet owners, diabetes, or more specifically, diabetes mellitus, is more common in cats and dogs. Therefore, you are not alone if you were unaware that your dog or cat could develop diabetes.
Diabetes develops when the pancreas of your pet either produces insufficient amounts of insulin or stops producing any insulin at all. Insulin resistance is a condition that happens when the body’s cells do not react appropriately to the insulin that the pancreas does produce.
Veterinary internal medicine specialists estimate that between one in 100 and one in 500 dogs will develop diabetes. Most dogs will be dependent on insulin at diagnosis, which is similar to type 1 diabetes in people. In these cases, the pancreas has permanently lost the ability to make sufficient insulin. That means diabetic dogs need lifelong insulin therapy.
Experts also estimate that between one in 100 and one in 500 cats will develop diabetes. The majority (70 to 75 percent) of cats are also insulin-dependent at diagnosis and will need lifelong insulin injections. The remaining 25 to 30 percent of cats have a form of diabetes that’s similar to human type 2 diabetes. Early diagnosis, treatment with insulin and a change in diet provides the greatest chance of reversing diabetes (called diabetic remission) in a cat. However, if a cat hasn’t gone into remission within six to 10 months of diagnosis, they’ll likely need lifelong insulin treatment.
Purdue and the IU School of Medicine collaborated on this work through the National Institute of Health T32 Indiana Bioengineering Interdisciplinary Training for Diabetes Research Program, which awarded a fellowship to Stephens to develop innovative technology for the treatment of diabetes.
“By first assisting dogs, we intend to account for differences between mice and humans.” To what extent the treatment might be effective in humans, we can learn from the dogs, explained Clarissa Hernandez Stephens, the study’s first author and a graduate student at Purdue’s Weldon School of Biomedical Engineering. In an upcoming issue of the American Journal of Physiology – Endocrinology and Metabolism, findings are already available in early view.
About one in every 100 companion animals in the U.S. has type 1 diabetes. S. , including dogs and cats, and approximately 1. 25 million American children and adults.
The Trojan horse, in this case, would be collagen, a protein that the body already makes for building muscles, bones, skin and blood vessels. A collagen formulation mixed with pancreatic cells, developed by Purdue University researchers in collaboration with the Indiana University School of Medicine, is the first minimally invasive therapy to successfully reverse Type 1 diabetes within 24 hours and maintain insulin independence for at least 90 days, a pre-clinical animal study shows.
The following step for diabetic pets is a pilot clinical study in naturally occurring Type 1 diabetes in dogs, which will be carried out in cooperation with Purdue’s College of Veterinary Medicine.
Myth #4: Diabetes is hereditary and can’t be prevented.
True and false. Genetic indicators suggest that some cat and dog breeds, including Siamese cats and Samoyeds, Cairn terriers, Border terriers, Dachshunds, and Schnauzers, are more likely to develop diabetes than others. However, that does not imply that all of those breeds of cats or dogs will have diabetes. They simply have a higher risk of contracting the illness, so precautions should be taken to lessen this risk.
To help your pet avoid diabetes:
FAQ
How long do dogs survive after being diagnosed with diabetes?
The median lifespan for diabetic dogs is two years, but many of them live significantly longer if they receive the right care and are regularly examined by a veterinarian. Therefore, when given the right care, dogs with diabetes generally lead happy, full lives free of symptoms.
How can I treat my dogs diabetes naturally?
A diet rich in fiber and complex carbohydrates is advised for dogs with Type I diabetes to support healthy digestion and blood sugar levels. Most of the time, a raw diet is best for both dogs and cats, or at the very least, a home-cooked diet.
Can a diabetic dog be treated without insulin?
Dogs with diabetes mellitus typically need two insulin injections per day in addition to dietary adjustments. Although a dog can go without insulin for a day or two without experiencing a crisis, this shouldn’t happen frequently; treatment should be considered a part of the dog’s daily routine.