Generex to Launch First Oral Insulin

Generex, a small independent pharmaceutical company, is set to launch the first ever commercially available non-injectable insulin in Ecuador in the beginning of 2006. Oral-lyn, as the insulin spray is branded, is applied to the mouth by the company's proprietary RapidMist delivery system.

For years, the big pharmaceutical companies have been chasing the holy grail of diabetes therapies – non-injectable insulin. A range of such products are set to explode on to the market in the next few years, ensuring a bitter grapple for market share.

The company is launching in Ecuador first due to their more relaxed drug trial requirements and they expect to use the revenue from the sale of the drug in South America to fund more expensive phase III trials for the US and Europe.

via: In Pharma Technologist

Inhalable Insulin May Be Delayed by FDA

Analysts estimate that Exubera, Pfizer's inhalable insulin, may be delayed by the FDA due to what some analysts claim is insufficient long-term testing testing on the effects of the drug on smokers and children.

Exubera is a dry, fine-powdered insulin that is inhaled into the lungs and then absorbed into the bloodstream.

Dr. Bill Canovatchel, senior medical director for Pfizer and the company's team leader for worldwide diabetes, acknowledged that Exubera does not have long-term testing that specifically addresses the drug's effect on smokers and children. But he noted that Pfizer has still done considerable testing.

"We have submitted a rather extensive and comprehensive submission," said Canovatchel.

Dr. Jay Skyler, a University of Miami professor of medicine and an associate director at the Diabetes Research Institute, said that Exubera and other inhaled insulin products could benefit from longer-term studies.

But Skyler said that Exubera still deserved FDA approval. "Inhaled insulin is effective, has no serious health issues and should receive regulatory approval," said Skyler. "I suspect the FDA will examine [Exubera] carefully because it's the first of its kind to go through there, but I think it meets the regulatory hurdles."

via: CNN Money

Palm Proposed as Alternate Testing Site

As far as I'm concerned, the most painful part of this whole diabetes thing is not the actual insulin injections, but the finger pricks necessary to check blood sugar levels. That's why I was excited to hear that a new study presented at the American Diabetes Association's 65th Annual Scientific Sessions reports that the palm can be used as a suitible alternative to finger prick testing.

The palm has plenty of blood capillaries and fewer pain receptors than the fingertips. Other body parts -- such as the forearm and thigh -- have also been proposed as alternate sites. But the palm is easy to access, say Schwartz and colleagues.

via: WebMD Health News

American Diabetes Association Launches Online Risk Assessment Tool

The ADA has just launched a powerful new tool called Diabetes PHD to determine your risk factors for diabetes and various related conditions. The tool asks you to enter your personal health history information and presents your risk factors with related explanations graphed as you age.

"DIABETES PHD or 'Diabetes Personal Health Decision,' provides personal health profiles to help people understand their risk for diabetes or its serious complications. The program creates a whole set of personal clinical trials enabling users to see what might happen in the future based on health behavior changes."

via: Yahoo News

Caffeine Helps Control Nocturnal Hypoglycemia in People With Type 1 Diabetes

"Researchers from Bournemouth in the United Kingdom studied 19 people with long-standing type 1 diabetes. All participants were given a low-caffeine diet (less than 50 milligrams/day) for two weeks. Some also received caffeine capsules (250 milligram) two times a day while others received a placebo. Researchers say the capsules are the equivalent to the average daily caffeine intake in the United Kingdom. Blood sugars were monitored using continuous glucose-sensing technology.

Study results show caffeine reduced the duration of nighttime hypoglycemia with an average duration of 49 minutes vs. 132 minutes."

via: Ivanhoe's Medical Breakthroughs - Caffeine Benefits People With Type 1 Diabetes

Diabetes Drug Sales to Double Industry Pace

A report published by Bernstein Research states that diabetes drug sales will outpace the industry average by two to one.

Diabetes-related drug sales are expected to jump 12 percent annually through 2011 worldwide, compared to industry-wide drug sales growth of 6 percent, said the Bernstein report. U.S. sales of diabetes drugs are expected to jump 15 percent annually.

via: CNN Money

38 Minutes to Better Diabetes Health

If you didn't know, ading a modest amount of excersice drastically improves your diabetes health. This is a nice article that explains a study that proves that the best results come from adding at least 38 minutes of excersice to your daily routine.

Increasing physical activity by 38 minutes a day helped people with type 2 diabetes improve their blood pressure, cholesterol, and blood sugar levels, even without losing weight. Those who walked a little longer (about an hour a day) made even more progress and shed some extra pounds, too.

via: WebMD

Pancreas Not Working? Liver Coaxed to Take Over

Work being performed by scientists in Israel's Sheba Medical Center may eventually lead to the use of a patients' own liver cells as a treatment for their diabetes. They have found that by treating adult liver cells with a substance that controls pancreatic cell development during gestation, these cells start behaving the same way as pancreatic cells and begin to secret insulin when transplanted into dibetic mice.

The Sheba team hopes that their work will avoid the need to rely on donor cells - or controversial alternatives, such as the use of stem cells taken from foetal or embryonic tissue.

They treated adult human liver cells with a factor that controls pancreas development in the embryo, called PDX-1.

This stimulated the cells to behave in the same way as insulin-producing pancreatic cells.

Not only did they start to produce the hormone, they began to secrete it in response to blood sugar levels.

When the cells were transplanted into mice with symptoms of diabetes, the animals' blood sugar levels gradually decreased.

via: BBC News UK

Diabetes Drug Based on Gila Monster Saliva Approved by FDA

Byetta (exenatide) is the first among a new class of diabetes drugs called incretin mimetics -- synthetic medications that mimic action of a hormone that spurs insulin production after a person eats and blood sugar levels rise above a certain threshold. Traditional diabetes drugs that promote insulin production do so even if glucose levels aren't high enough, which could cause a dangerous low blood-sugar condition called hypoglycemia.

Byetta, derived from the lizard's saliva, mimics that action of the human hormone GLP-1, which prompts the body to secrete insulin and is also thought to play a role in deciding when a person feels full.

via: PakTribune

Rats Cured of Diabetes by Precise Transplant of Pig Cells

I know what you're thinking... "great, rats can get cured by pigs, just what we need!"

It seems that scientists at the Washington University of Medicine have been able to cure rats of diabetes by transplanting embryonic pig pancreas primordia. Primordia is are not like stem cells that can become any type of tissue, but instead can only become certain types of cells or group of cells that will eventually become a particular organ or tissue. The researchers found that rats would accept these transplants without the need for immuno-suppression drugs to prevent rejection as long as the cells were less than 35 embryonic days old.

In their earlier studies, Hammerman and Rogers had shown that transplantation of pig pancreatic primordia into diabetic rats cures their diabetes permanently without the need for immune suppression. The pig primordia are transplanted into the omentum, a membrane that envelopes the intestines and other digestive organs. When the primordia mature, they replace the missing rat insulin with pig insulin, returning the rats' blood glucose to normal levels.

via: EurekAlert!The next step in this research is to test the transplant procedure with primates. The Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation has provided funding to facilitate these tests with the hope that, if successful, pig-to-human transplants would be next.

Insulin Found to be Antigen for Type 1 Diabetes

Researchers at the Harvard School of Medicine have identified insulin as the trigger for Type 1 Diabetes, the genetically inherited form of the disease.

For reasons that remain unclear, in patients with type 1 diabetes the body's immune T-cells react against insulin-producing cells in the pancreas -- effectively shutting them down and triggering disease onset.

via: Forbes

Make that Type 1

About 4-1/2 months ago, my doctor let me know that it seemed that my body was no longer making any insulin and that I would have to start insulin therapy. She started me off on Novalog 70/30 twice per day. More on why this has happened and how it's going to come in future posts.