Study: Artificial pancreas outperforms pump therapy

Data from 2 new studies of closed-loop artificial pancreas indicates the device outperformed sensor-augmented pump therapy treatment for patients with Type 1 diabetes.

The findings were presented September 17 at the European Association for the Study of Diabetes 2015 meeting in Stockholm, Sweden, and published in the New England Journal of Medicine.

After 12-weeks being treated with the artificial pancreas, patients showed improved glucose control, reduced hypoglycemia and, in adults, lower glycated hemoglobin levels when compared to control therapies, according to the study.

The 2 studies examined 58 patients, 33 adults and 25 children, with type 1 diabetes over 12 weeks. Patients received treatment with an “artificial beta cell”, otherwise known as a closed-loop artificial pancreas, for a 12-week period, and treatment with a sensor-augmented insulin pump for a similar period. The devices were used at home under what the researchers called “free-living” conditions.

The studies found that with the closed-loop system, glucose levels were in the target range 11% more often than with the control therapy.

In children and adolescents, the closed-loop system provided 24.7% more time in the target glucose range.

“Our main aim was to be able to show that closed-loop application works in the day and night period, especially in the long term, and without supervision….We are now at a stage where we’ve shown that prolonged 3-month, day/night use of closed-loop control in adults is feasible, and 3-month overnight control in children is feasible,” lead investigator Dr. Hood Thabit of the U.K.’s University of Cambridge told Medscape Medical News.

The study did not use a “bionic pancreas,” which uses both insulin and glucagon, but instead used a “beta cell” artificial pancreas which used only insulin.

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