New hope is on the horizon for type I diabetes sufferers thanks to a new type of transplant.
An islet transplant, which was successfully performed in Wisconsin for the first time by the director of the Islet Transplant Program at UW Hospitals, Dr. Jon Odorico, on Sept. 18, is designed to take type I diabetes patients off of insulin.
Islets, located in the pancreas, make insulin and control blood sugar. Since type I diabetes sufferers are insulin deficient, transplanted islets would do the job their own islets do not.
In contrast to type I, type II diabetes sufferers produce too much insulin. According to Odorico, “[Islet transplants] could one day be done for type II diabetes, because eventually their islets burn out, and then they are deficient.”
Odorico said the process of transplanting islets begins by recovering a pancreas from a human donor.
After the organ is recovered, it goes through an islet-isolation process, which takes about six to eight hours.
Orodico said the UW Islet Transplant program is working with Washington University to complete the islet-isolation process.
“We ship them the pancreas, and they do the isolation process for us,” Odorico said.
In the isolation process, the islets are separated from pancreatic tissue, undergo purification, and are examined for quality.
After the completion of the isolation process, the islets are shipped back to UW. In the labs there, the isolated islets go through quality-control tests in a processing facility.
Finally, the islets are ready for transplantation.
“It’s not a major surgery; it’s more like a 30-minute procedure,” said Odorico.
Odorico described the transplantation process.
“[The islets] are infused into the patient through an intravenous, but not into the vein, like a regular IV, but into a vein that goes into the liver,” Odorico said. “The islets are lodged into small liver veins. It’s done through a catheter placed into the liver vein through the skin.”
The islet transplant procedure has a success rate of 75 to 85 percent for one year, meaning patients are off of insulin for a year following the procedure, claimed Odorico. He added that usually more than one transplant is required.
“Diabetes is a miserable disease, and any advances we can make to help improve their life would be a benefit,” Odorico said.
“People who have diabetes have a higher chance of kidney failure and even blindness,” said Dr. Hans Sollinger, chief of the Division of Transplantation at the UW Hospital. “Hopefully, this transplant can prevent that.”
Sollinger said UW has been working on islet transplantation for two years. The study needed approval from the Food and Drug Administration, as well as the National Institute of Health.
Odorico is currently working on an FDA-approved islet-transplant study in 16 patients.
