In a breakthrough for the global fight against diabetes, a bionic pancreas device has passed the major test to control insulin levels in diabetics. The device has been successfully tested in two five-day clinical trials – one in adults and the other in adolescents – that imposed minimal restrictions on patient activities. The device controlled blood sugar in patients with type 1 diabetes using doses of both insulin and the blood-sugar-raising hormone glucagon, according to researchers from Boston University (BU) and Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) who published their study results in a New England Journal of Medicine paper on Monday. “In both of these studies this device far exceeded our expectations in terms of its ability to regulate glucose, prevent hypoglycemia and automatically adapt to the very different needs of adults – some of whom were very insulin-sensitive – and adolescents who typically need higher insulin doses,” said Edward Damiano of the BU Department of Biomedical Engineering and principal investigator of the project. “There’s no current standard-of-care therapy that could match the results we saw,” he added.
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