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Juvenile diabetes
AN EXPERIMENTAL drug appears to stop juvenile diabetes in its tracks, allowing patients to reduce insulin injections and control their disease better, according to a recent study. to be published recently.
The drug, given for two weeks, soon after patients were diagnosed as suffering from Type 1 or juvenile diabetes, appeared to halt the destruction of the patients' insulin-producing cells for at least a year, preserving their ability to produce some of their own insulin.
Scientists cautioned that since only 12 patients had been treated, the results were preliminary but still tantalising.
"`For the very first time in humans with this disease, you can apparently alter the clinical course with something that's relatively nontoxic,'' said Dr. Robert Goldstein, chief scientific officer of the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, which sponsored the study with the National Institute of Health. A large clinical trial showed that giving insulin injections to people at risk of developing
Type 1 diabetes did not prevent the disease. The results contradicted those of smaller studies that had raised hopes . ``It's very disappointing,'' said Dr. Jay S. Skyler, chief of endocrinology at the University of Miami. ``We had hoped this would be a solution.''
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