I recently heard from someone that there have been two separate cases found where boys that had been diagnosed with type 1 diabetes at an early age “grew out” of the disease by the time they reached age 11 or 12. Have you heard of this? Or, is the person giving me this information misinformed?

I believe what you may be referring to is cases of Neonatal Diabetes. This is an unusual form of diabetes (two per million), defined as diabetes that occurs within the first 30 days of life, lasts for over two weeks, and requires insulin. About half of such children have permanent diabetes, one-fourth have transient diabetes that resolves, and another one-fourth have diabetes that resolves in the neonatal period but then recurs when they are older.

Most of these children do not have classic “type 1” diabetes in that they do not have autoimmune disease that destroys pancreatic beta cells. The causes of their diabetes vary widely and include problems with pancreatic formation and unusual metabolic syndromes.

LAD