# Islet transplants get new support – from artificial skin



## Northerner (Sep 14, 2016)

A new way of holding insulin producing islet cells inside the body has been developed. At the Royal Adelaide Hospital in southern Australia, doctors have been trialling artificial skin, already used globally in burns injuries, as a potential site for the  transplant of donor islet cells used in the treatment of type 1 diabetes.

*Transplanting artificial skin*






Professor Toby Coates, Director of Kidney and Pancreatic Islet Transplantation and Associate Professor John Greenwood AM, Director of the Burns Unit, are looking into the effectiveness of transplanting islet cells into artificial skin made of a biodegradable material, rather than into the liver.

https://jdrf.org.uk/news/skin-scaffolds-support-beta-cells/

Sounds promising


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## mikeyB (Sep 14, 2016)

It does indeed sound promising. It just needs the further step of producing islet cells from stem cells to prevent possible rejection.


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## Matt Cycle (Sep 15, 2016)

Good news.  JDRF do some great work and are the only charity whose sole focus is Type 1 including that elusive 'cure'.


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## HOBIE (Sep 15, 2016)

Tech is getting better !  Believe it or not


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## Diabeticliberty (Sep 16, 2016)

HOBIE said:


> Tech is getting better !  Believe it or not



Another 4 or 5 years and I might get to replace my toupe with the original real McCoy


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## grovesy (Sep 16, 2016)

I was reading on a US site someone quoting the cure in 5-10 years figure that is trotted out . We will see!


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## Northerner (Sep 16, 2016)

grovesy said:


> I was reading on a US site someone quoting the cure in 5-10 years figure that is trotted out . We will see!


According to what I read when I was diagnosed 8 years ago I should only have another two years to wait!   I think there are quite a few Nabarro Medallists (DUK 50 years of diabetes) who were told '10 years' over 40 years ago!

I've often wondered if an islet cell transplant could be given to someone who has become diabetic due to removal of their pancreas, since the cells aren't put in the pancreas anyway.


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## mikeyB (Sep 16, 2016)

Northerner said:


> According to what I read when I was diagnosed 8 years ago I should only have another two years to wait!   I think there are quite a few Nabarro Medallists (DUK 50 years of diabetes) who were told '10 years' over 40 years ago!
> 
> I've often wondered if an islet cell transplant could be given to someone who has become diabetic due to removal of their pancreas, since the cells aren't put in the pancreas anyway.


This procedure is already done. Total pancreatectomy with islet cell harvesting and transplant is already done in America. One centre in the UK does it, in Newcastle, but that is on hold at the moment because of funding of the lab that does the harvesting. It isn't always completely successful, though.


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