August 31, 2002
Research: Other Research
Question from Framingdale, New Jersey, USA:
My daughter, diagnosed with type 1 diabetes a year ago, is still in the honeymoon period and not requiring much insulin (9 units and 1.5 units). I’ve been trying to follow the clinical trials such as islet cell transplants and peptide treatment. These are both promising but not proven cures. I believe people with diabetes who are still making some insulin (recently diagnosed) versus those that are not will benefit much more from these treatments. My concern is that my daughter will probably be coming out of her honeymoon period soon, and her doctor did not suggest any trial that we should be looking at.
Is there any trial going on that I should look into while she is in her honeymoon period? I don’t want to miss something that we should have tried, but I also don’t want her to be a guinea pig for an untested treatment.
Answer:
Your child’s diabetes team are the best to know what trials may be available. Most research trials do not use small children and usually try things out on adults first before experimenting with kids so that side effects in children are minimized or prevented.
There is lots of research ongoing so your best strategy is to do lots of blood glucose testing, become very aware and knowledgeable about current diabetes management for children and ask questions of the diabetes team to keep current. Join the American Diabetes Association and Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation and read their magazines since they also will keep you current. Go to their websites. The recent Children with Diabetes congress in Pasadena involved about 1000 people and provided such updates with lots of time for questions and answers from experts participating. Use all these resources.
SB
