When diabetes enters the doors of someone’s life the life of this person changes dramatically. Diabetes is a disorder of metabolism. It is characterized by inappropriately high blood sugar which is the result of either low level of the hormone insulin or of abnormal resistance to insulin’s effects. The percentage of people in the USA suffering from the disease is rather high: 7.0 percent of the population has diabetes, of a serious, lifelong condition. This comprises 20.8 million, among this number 14.6 million have been diagnosed and 6.2 million have not yet been diagnosed. All those people wait for the effective cure from the disease that tortures them. But unfortunately, we may state the fact that there is no such a cure for diabetes.
As diabetes is a disease in which the body does not produce or properly use insulin, it is a diffused opinion that injecting insulin is a cure for diabetes. Indeed, insulin allows a diabetic to survive, but the consequences of the blood sugar level controlled in such a way has may turn to be really devastating ones. The thing is that a diabetic’s insulin injections cannot be appropriately adjusted to maintain safe sugar level unlike the precise matching of blood sugar and insulin levels that occur in the sound body.
There are two possible side-effects of injecting insulin. When it drives blood sugar level too low, the diabetic’s reactions include confusion, loss of consciousness, coma, or even death. The second type of the consequences that injecting insulin might have is when the blood levels rise. The diabetic is amendable to eyes, kidneys, nerves and heart diseases. It comes out that insulin is not a cure for diabetes, as it fails to restore the person’s ability to adjust insulin production to match the uncontrollable variations of sugar that come from a normal life.
The problem of cure for diabetes should be regarded in terms of different types of the disease. Actually, there are three of them. The two principal forms of diabetes are types 1 and 2.
Type 1 diabetes refers to childhood-onset diabetes, juvenile diabetes and insulin-dependent diabetes. Type 2 diabetes embraces adult-onset diabetes, obesity-related diabetes and non-insulin dependent diabetes. The so-called type 3 diabetes is also known as gestational diabetes. It may develop late in pregnancy and either disappear after the birth of the baby or progress into the type 2 diabetes.
Considering the first type of the diabetes we should say that there are numerous ongoing researches on various approaches to cure it. But there is no sufficient cure found. The disease is expected to be cured by replacing the pancreas or the beta cells. Transplants do produce insulin but the reaction of the immune system for them leaves much to be desired. Moreover, the transplants generally remain on long-term immunosuppressive drugs and the immune system will work out a host versus graft response against the transplanted organ. Thus, the main objective of the research is to develop the transplant therapy so that it does not harm the human’s body.
Most scientists believe that curing type 1 diabetes means causing endogenous ability of the body to react to the level of blood glucose by means of producing insulin and their attempts do not go behind this aim. Whereas other approaches such as closed-loop integrated glucometer or insulin pump products may also turn beneficial. They may sufficiently increase the quality of life of those who suffer from diabetes type 1 and may be regarded as artificial pancreas. We are inclined to believe that research should be conducted in this sphere that seems to be a much promising one.
As for the second type of diabetes, scientists claim that it can be cured by bariatric surgery known as gastric bypass. In the process of this therapy the stomach’s size is reduced and the small intestine changes its direction to minimize calorie intake. Though this surgery has been successfully performed, it cannot be applied to all patients as the weight loss is not healthy for all.
Fortunately, the gestational diabetes can be cured by means of a simple diet that a pregnant woman keeps on. The cure for this diabetes type is the best explored.
Scientists state that diabetes has reached pandemic levels; therefore immediate measures are to be assumed. The cure for diabetes should be characterized by the following:
- The source of islets should not depend on human donors, but must be abundant;
- The use of the suppressing drugs should be reduced to minimum;
- The islets should not introduce any pathogens;
- The risk and the complexity of the transplantation procedure should be reduced to minimum.
Besides the approaches to the diabetes cure cited above there are also gene therapy approach, stem cells approach, spleen cells approach, nanotechnology approach, aspirin with electrophoresis approach and a lot of others which are aimed at curing the disease. Contributing to the problem, all of them have a rather one-sided nature which does not influence positively its solution.
Works Cited
- “Beta Cell Biology Consortium.” Environmental Health Perspectives 109.2 (2001).
- “Diabetes.” Ebony. 1999: 111.
- Aitken, Murray, et al. “A License to Cure.” The McKinsey Quarterly (2000): 80.
- Chappell, Kevin. “A Surgical “Cure” for Diabetes? Nine out 10 Gastric-Bypass Patients with the Disease Report Dramatic Drops in Blood Sugar Levels, but Some Doctors Warn about Taking Such a Drastic Step.” Ebony. 2007: 84+.
- Chappell, Kevin. “Diabetes Management Goes High-Tech; New Devices, Personalized Care Help to Control Deadly Disease.” Ebony 2006: 158+.
- Chappell, Kevin. “Diabetes Treatment, Research & Cure.” Ebony. 2005: 126+.
- Gavin, James R. Iii. “Diabetes.” Ebony. 2000: 52.
- Randal, Judith. “Insulin Key to Diabetes but Not Full Cure.” FDA Consumer 1992: 15+.