How stem cell therapy helps diabetic patients?

Diabetes is a medical condition, in which the body is unable to properly regulate sugar in the body. It is a lifelong condition, which can be controlled but a cure for which is yet to be discovered. Diabetes has affected more than four hundred million worldwide, and this number is rapidly increasing. Diabetes can cause a number of life-threatening health problems like strokes, cataracts, heart attacks, kidney failure, and nerve damage to name a few. In some cases, it can be controlled with a combination of insulin or other drugs, diet and regular exercise.

In Type 1 diabetes, your body attacks itself and destroys the beta cells. It implies that the body is unable to produce insulin, which makes is unable to deliver the necessary glucose to the cells.

In Type 2 diabetes, in spite of body producing the insulin, the body remains unable to glucose to the cells.

Stem cells

Stem cells have the ability to transform into a type of cell in the human body. Stem cells function to provide new cells in the body and also replace cells that have been lost or damaged.

Stem cells have no defined purpose. But can transform into specific cells as per the body’s requirement. They are being researched to study how different functions of the body work and how they sometimes go wrong.

Stem cells are being investigated by scientists for fighting diseases that currently have no cure.

They can be manipulated into becoming targeted cells, which are then used to repair or regenerate damaged cells.

Researches are currently being done for diseases like Type 1 diabetes, stroke, burns, cancer, spinal cord injuries, heart disease, Alzheimer’s, etc.

Stem cell therapy for diabetes

With such a high ration of the world’s population under the grasp of this disease, there is an increasing demand for finding a cure. Stem cell therapy is being used to study the way in which our bodies process sugar.

The clinical trials conducted with animals have proved to be immensely successful, which has resulted in a number of human clinical trials. The mesenchymal stem cells are being used in these trials for two purposes. Firstly, their usefulness is being evaluated in directly treating diabetes. Secondly, they are evaluated for treating complications caused by diabetes.

Stem cell therapy for diabetes has a bright future. Research is ongoing where these cells are used as a way to create beta cells which can be transplanted into the patients suffering from type 1 diabetes and also protecting the beta cells from further damage.

The key for this approach to work is to plant these beta cells in the part of the body where they can defend the immune system’s attack. This can be achieved by placing the beta cells in protective capsules. These capsules are designed to allow insulin and glucose, as well as shielding the beta cells from the immune system.

For type 1 diabetes, a number of clinical trials are already being conducted. But further research is required to make sure whether any of these approaches is safe and effective.