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Painless breakthrough for diabetics
UV trails would eliminate need for blood tests
Average monthly blood-glucose levels are deteremined
by Lois Watson Sunday Star Times
A breakthrough non-invasive and painless system for assessing people's average blood-sugar levels is about to undergo clinical trials in Christchurch.
It could revolutionize the way diabetics' long term glucose levels are monitored and provide an easier way to identify people with the disease, which affects around 174,000 New Zealanders and their families.
Average monthly blood-glucose levels are determined through blood tests. But scientists at Canterbury University believe they can produce a machine which can detect glucose levels accurately by the fluorescence of skin under ultra-violet light.
They are working with medical researchers ate Christchurch Hospital, to clinically test the machine which could provide diabetics sufferers with an accurate snapshot of the blood-sugar levels so they can adjust their food, exercise and medication without the need for painful blood tests.
Dr Brett Shand, of the Lipid and Diabetes Research Group at Christchurch Hospital , said trails could take around two years but the technology would transform the way long-term glucose levels were monitored.
For patients, all the test would involve was having a fluorescent light shone on their skin. “The measurement takes two to three minutes. It’s non-invasive, painless and the UV-exposure is harmless.” Shand said. It would also be cheaper than laboratory blood tests.
The test could also be used for screening. “It could help us identify patients who could have diabetes and require blood test to confirm the diagnosis. Early detection is so important because if we get on top of the disease at an early stage it reduces the risk of complications.”
Shand said it was proposed to initially use the new testing regime on patients with type 2 diabetes but it could also be used on young children with type-1 diabetes.
Type-2 diabetes is by far the most common form in New Zealand , with and estimated 140,000 sufferers. And the numbers are increasing rapidly. In some groups, up to 12% are type -2 diabetic once aged over 40.New Zealand’s leading diabetes expert Emeritus Professor Don Beaven, of the Christchurch School of medicine, is excited by the potential break through, which he believes could make it much easier fro people to control their diabetes and reduce the risk of complications such as eye damage and kidney disease.
He could foresee a time when the machines were available in every doctor’s surgery.
“ New Zealand has the second highest rate of diabetes in the world. This disease is a bid drain on our health resources and if we can help people manage it and educate them about blood sugar levels it could make a huge difference,” Beaven said.
In another positive development for diabetics, a new drug that can extend the life of type-2 diabetes sufferers and reduce complications comes before a Pharmac advisory committee next month.
The drug, Januvia, lowers the blood-sugar levels of a patient with early stage type-2 diabetes, decreasing the chances of amputations, blindness and heart and liver disease.
Published on this website on Tue, 04 Nov 2008