City of Hope researchers have found that bone marrow transplantation with islet cell transplantation shows promise as a treatment for late-stage Type 1 diabetes.
Islet cells come from the pancreas. The cells from this combination of treatments could enable diabetics to once again make their own insulin.
Results from laboratory research, led by Dr. Defu Zeng, an associate professor in the departments of Diabetes Research and Hematology & Hematopoietic Cell Transplantation at City of Hope in Duarte, were published online this month in the journal "Diabetes."
In Type 1 diabetes, patients' immune cells mistakenly attack insulin-producing cells in the pancreas, decimating the cells and leaving patients without enough insulin to function.
More than 23.6 million people in the United States have been diagnosed with diabetes, and an estimated 5 to 10 percent of these individuals have Type 1 diabetes, according to the American Diabetes Association.
One investigational therapy for severe Type 1 diabetes is islet cell transplantation, a procedure in which physicians transplant donated islet cells into the patient's liver, where they can engraft, take root and produce insulin.
Yet, there are several challenges to long-term islet transplantation success. Patients' immune cells may again attack the transplanted cells, and immunosuppressive medications sometimes keep the new cells from properly functioning. The liver also can be an inhospitable site for these transplanted cells. "Islet cell transplants usually only provide two to three years of insulin independence for most recipients," said co-lead author Dr. Miao Wang, a postdoctoral fellow in Zeng's lab. "We wanted to find a way to extend that insulin independence."
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