A new kind of implant could one day make it far easier for people with type 1 diabetes to manage their disease. The insulin-making implant is a mixture of transplanted islets cells and medical technology, inserted just below the skin in a person’s arm, and if it perform well in clinical trials, it could potentially last for years.
The challenge: Insulin is a hormone that our bodies use to convert sugar in our blood into energy. People with type 1 diabetes don’t produce enough (or any) insulin — if left untreated, this causes dangerously high blood sugar levels, leading to serious health issues or even death.
Regularly checking blood sugar levels and injecting synthetic insulin when they’re high is the most common way to treat type 1 diabetes, but it isn’t the only way.
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