Is There A Faster Cheaper and Painless Way To Test Diabetes?

Diabetes, if not managed or treated with care, could easily lead to serious medical conditions including blindness, heart disease, high blood pressure, kidney disease, nervous system disease, stroke and amputation.

In order to diagnose whether a person is having diabetes or pre-diabetes, doctors usually use a fasting plasma glucose (FPG) test to measure blood glucose in that person who has not eaten anything for at least 8 hours. Sometimes, an oral glucose tolerance test (OGTT), which measures blood glucose after the person fasts at least 8 hours and 2 hours after the person drinks a glucose-containing beverage, might also be employed.

For diagnosis of diabetes (not for pre-diabetes), a random plasma glucose test is used. The test, also known as casual plasma glucose test, measures blood glucose of a person at any time without regarding when this person last ate.

Here comes the so-called Wrinkle Test, which is considered as a faster and cheaper method to diagnose if a person has diabetes. The Wrinkle Test can identify a disorder in the sensors on a person’s skin and was developed by researchers at the National University of Singapore (NUS) and the National University Hospital (NUH).

Carrying out the test is fairly simple. Apply a local anesthetic as cream on the fingers of the person being tested. If the skin does not wrinkle after some time, then this person must has a nerve fiber disorder that could be caused by disease like diabetes.

The results of the test are compared against a scale of between zero and 4. Zero indicates there is no wrinkling and is a sign that the constriction of blood vessels is being impaired. Studies have shown that wrinkling is caused by a constriction of blood vessels. A patient with a small nerve fiber disorder, which disrupts the constriction, would have fewer wrinkles.

Though many diseases could actually cause a disorder on the small nerve fibers on the patients’ skin, diabetes is the most important cause because almost half of the diabetic patients in Singapore suffer from some kind of the disorder.

Nevertheless, Wrinkle test is surely not the only way to identify nerve fiber disorders. In fact, nerve disorder could be diagnosed by removing a skin sample, which was then sent to laboratory for testing. And it usually takes between 1 to 2 weeks before results can be known.

The Number of Diabetics Rises In Europe!

According to IDF (International Diabetes Federation), diabetes affects 246 million people worldwide and the figure is expected to rise to some 380 million by 2025.

People should never treat diabetes lightly because it could lead to fatal consequences. Diabetics might have symptoms such as frequent urination, thirst, unexpected weight loss, extreme hunger, and frequent fatigue. If the blood glucose is too high, they can develop comatose.

If the blood sugar level is not controlled effectively, diabetes can lead to blindness, neuropathy (damage to nerves), and even lower-limb amputations. Patients, who also have hypertension (high blood pressure), can have a higher chance of getting kidney failure. Meanwhile, one should not forget that diabetes has been a known risk factor for cardiovascular and heart disease, too.

A study, published on May 28, 2009 in the British Journal ‘The Lancet’, revealed that incidence of Type-1 diabetes in children aged below 5 in Europe is expected to double and those aged below 15 will increase by 70 percent by 2020 over the 2005 levels.

Based on diagnosed cases between 1989 and 203, the researchers warned that the trend will be highest in the former Communist countries of Eastern Europe. The dramatic increase could be attributed to genes as well as the modern lifestyle habits.

In general, there are 2 types of diabetes, namely Type-1 and Type-2 diabetes. Type-1 diabetes generally begins during childhood and early adolescence. The immune system destroys cells in the pancreas that make insulin, and this does cause the glucose level in the blood to rise dangerously. Insulin is the hormone, which breaks down glucose into other forms of energy.

A mix of genetic vulnerability and environmental factors, such as increases in weight and height, less exposure to early infections in childhood and delivery by caesarean, might cause such disorder, according to health experts.

On the other hand, Type-2 diabetes occurs when there is insufficient insulin or cells become insensitive to the insulin that is produced. It is closely linked to chronic obesity, resulting from sedentary lifestyles and the consumption of sugary and fatty foods. The number of Type-2 diabetics is far more than Type-1 diabetics.

Tobacco Can Be Useful, Are You Sure?

Smoking and tobacco have always been linked to unhealthy news. Smokers not only have the higher chance of getting heart disease, lung cancers, and other ailments, the secondhand smoke originated from them could also cause harmful effects to the people around them. Many studies have confirmed the claim.

However, an interesting finding by researchers from the University of Verona have found a healthy use for tobacco after they genetically bled modified plants containing a medicine that could stop Type-1 diabetes.

They published their findings on March 19, 2009 in the journal BMC Biotechnology and indicated out that they had produced tobacco plants containing a potent anti-inflammatory protein known as interleukin-10 (IL-10), which could help patients with insulin-dependent Type-1 diabetes and other autoimmune diseases.

Agrochemical companies such as Bayer and Syngenta have been searching ways to produce complex protein drugs in plants but the progress has been slow.

The new finding is believed to mark the latest advance in the emerging field of molecular farming that might offer an alternative way of producing biotech drugs and vaccines at a cost cheaper than traditional factory systems do.

The European researchers believe the antibody medicines and vaccines, which are produced in cell cultures inside stainless steel fermenters, could eventually be grown more efficiently in fields. This is because plants are the world's most cost-effective protein producers. They have studied several different plants around the world, but tobacco is their firm favorite.

The researchers’ work has drawn the attention from tobacco giant Philip Morris, which is supporting a conference on plant-based medicine in Verona in June 2009.

Meanwhile, Swedish biotech company Diamyd has already been testing a conventionally produced GAD65 vaccine against diabetes in clinical trials. On the other hand, Protalix plans to submit its drug for regulatory approval in the United States and Israel in the 4th quarter of 2009.

Using Stem Cell To Fix Damaged Heart!

If heart disease patients can make use of their own cells to repair their hearts, then people do not need to wait for donated hearts, which is always in short supply. Meanwhile, they also do not need to rely on dangerous medications to stop their body from rejecting the foreign organs.

This is the goal, which scientists have been striving to achieve. It seems that this dream is going to be realized in the very near future.

On July 20, 2009, a study that was published in the peer review journal Circulation revealed that researchers from the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota have managed to reverse some of the damages caused by heart attack using stem cells that were induced from connective tissue cells. The proof-of-concept study on mice is the first attempt to use induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells to treat heart disease.

Using the technique of nuclear reprogramming, the researchers believe they could reverse the fate of adult cells and customize on demand cardiovascular regenerative medicine. In fact, the research team genetically reprogrammed fibroblast cells, which contribute to the formation of connective tissues and scars, so that they became stem cells capable of developing into new heart muscle.

They transplanted these cells into mouse with damaged hearts and found that the cells had managed to stop progression of structural damage within 4 weeks. They also found that heart muscle performance that was lost after the heart attack was restored and tissue at the site of the damage was regenerated.

Stem cells do offer great potential for regenerative medicine as they can be coaxed into becoming lab-dish replacements for heart, liver, skin, eye, brain, nerve and other cells destroyed by disease, accident, war or normal wear-and-tear. In the meantime, they also have potential to cure diseases such as Parkinson's disease, Alzheimer's and Type-1 diabetes though research was limited because they were obtained from embryos.

In 2007, scientists discovered a way to reprogram adult skin cells into stem cells using embryos and exponentially increased the number of stem cells available for research purposes.

However, the iPS cells have not yet been approved for testing on humans and it will definitely take quite some time before it could be used in treatments.

Vitamin-D Help Babies Stay Away From Type-1 Diabetes!

Also known as, “juvenile diabetes” previously, Type-1 diabetes is usually found in children and young adults. For people with Type-1 diabetes, their bodies do not produce insulin, which is a hormone that can convert sugar (or glucose), starches and other food into energy.

Incidentally, a person who has Type-1 diabetes can develop medical complications such as heart disease (cardiovascular disease), blindness, nerve damage and kidney damage.

In a recent paper published in May 2008 in the Archives of Disease in Childhood, researchers from Stockport National Health Service Foundation Trust and Booth Hall Children's Hospital in Manchester, United Kingdom reported that if small children were given supplemental Vitamin-D, they would be prevented from developing Type-1 diabetes later on.

Basing on a number of clues suggesting link between low Vitamin-D levels and Type-1 diabetes, the researchers reviewed all published research on Vitamin-D supplementation and diabetes risk, and found that infants given Vitamin-D supplement were 29 percent less likely to develop Type-1 diabetes than those who had not received supplements.

Nevertheless, they suggested that proper clinical trials should be carried out to determine the optimal dose and formulation of Vitamin-D, when and for how long Vitamin-D should be given to children.

Meanwhile, the researchers also advise parents to ask from their pediatricians for prescription of Vitamin-D supplements for their infants. Alternatively, they can also get the supplement over the counter, provided they adhere strictly to the manufacturers’ instructions.

Vitamin-D is produced in the skin when exposing in sunlight. A shortage of Vitamin-D can lead to a number of health problems.

As only little Vitamin-D is found in breast milk, the American Academy of Pediatrics recommends Vitamin-D supplements for nursing infants. In United Kingdom, the public health authorities also urge parents to give their children Vitamin-D supplements for at least the first 2 years of their life.

How Adma Is Linked To Heart Risk in Diabetics?

Adma is the abbreviation for asymmetric dimethylarginine. It is a naturally occurring component of human blood plasma, and it can inhibit a compound that is capable of dilating blood vessels.

Diabetes has been identified as a risk factor for heart disease. A recent study by Steno Diabetes Center, Gentofte, Denmark found that people with Type-1 diabetes and kidney disease are at higher risk of heart-related events and progressive kidney disease because of the high blood levels of Adma.

In fact, previous research has already shown that high blood levels of Adma do reduce the ability of the blood vessels to widen, and this would lead to an increased risk of heart and blood vessel disease.

In the new study, researchers investigated how the value of Adma could be related to heart and kidney events in 397 Type-1 diabetic patients with diabetic kidney disease and 175 diabetic controls without kidney disease.

For patients with diabetics with kidney disease, those with Adma levels above the median were more likely (43.4 percent) to suffer a fatal or nonfatal major cardiovascular event such as heart attack than those with Adma levels below the median (19.4 percent).

Moreover, patients with Adma levels above the median also experienced a faster decline in their kidney function than those with lower Adma levels. Meanwhile, the researchers also indicated that patients with higher Adma levels were 3.2 times more likely to develop end-stage renal disease (the most advanced form of kidney disease) than those with lower levels of Adma.

The overall mortality was found to be 67 percent higher for patients with higher Adma levels than those with lower Adma levels.

If other future studies could also confirm similar finding, then Adma might be used by doctors to identify relevant Type-1 diabetic who are at particularly high risk of adverse heart and kidney-related events.

Why Are Weight Gain For Type-1 Diabetics Not Big Deal?

Diabetics, who can be classified as Type-1 or Type-2, have high levels of sugar in their blood. For Type-2 diabetics, weight gain can be very bad for them. It is believed that this kind of diabetes is driven by rising rates of obesity and sedentary lifestyles.

On the other hand, Type-1 diabetes, previous known as juvenile diabetes, is an autoimmune disease, in which the body mistakenly destroys cells in the pancreas that make insulin.

The function of insulin is to convert sugar, or glucose, into energy. The excess sugar in the blood will damage organs including the eyes, kidneys and heart for both types of diabetes. Diabetics are at high risk of developing heart disease, kidney failure and blindness.

A recent study by the researchers at the University of Pittsburgh indicated that people who gained weight over time were less likely to die than others studied, while those classified as underweight were facing greatest risk for death. Even obese or overweight Type-1 diabetics were less likely to die.

The researchers tracked 655 patients with Type-1 diabetes for 20 years and found that those people who gained the most weight over time seemed to have lower mortality than those who gained less weight or lost weight. According to the researchers’ interpretation, Type-1 diabetics are often underweight. If they were able to gain weight, it means that they may also able to control their disease better. The findings were presented at a meeting of the American Diabetes Association in San Francisco during June 2008.

When statistically accounted for waist circumference (a risk factor for death), the researchers also discovered that overweight or obese patients were less likely to die when compared with patients with a normal weight.

Perhaps, based on the findings, the concerns on growing rates of obesity will have to be looked differently for Type-1 diabetics than for the general population. However, people should not take the results of this study as excuse for them to go out, eat, and put on weight.