Pharmacological approaches to the prevention of autoimmune diabetes

Drugs
W E WinterD Schatz

Abstract

Insulin-dependent (type I) diabetes mellitus (IDDM) is the consequence of a chronic cell-mediated immune attack upon the insulin-producing beta-cells. Progressive insulinopenia is characteristic of individuals who eventually develop IDDM. Autoimmunity develops because of a failure in self-nonself discrimination. Autoimmunity is usually detected when autoantibodies are present in the patient's serum. However, autoantibodies are not synonymous with disease, as many autoantibody-positive individuals show no evidence of clinical disease. Studies initiated in the early 1980s demonstrated that short term remission from IDDM could be induced or lengthened with immunosuppressive therapy. However, no long term remissions were achieved. Current prevention strategies use a combination of autoantibody marker testing and beta-cell function testing to identify individuals with 'prediabetes'. The most useful autoantibodies for prediabetes screening include islet cell autoantibodies, insulin autoantibodies, glutamic acid decarboxylase autoantibodies and IA-2 autoantibodies. Immunointervention techniques have focused on protecting beta-cells from oxidative damage and developing tolerance to beta-cell autoantigens. Environmental manipulation may...Continue Reading

Citations

Sep 13, 2003·Journal of Immunological Methods·Silvina N ValdezEdgardo Poskus
Mar 5, 2003·Diabetes Technology & Therapeutics·William E WinterDesmond Schatz
Jan 22, 2003·BioDrugs : Clinical Immunotherapeutics, Biopharmaceuticals and Gene Therapy·William E Winter, Desmond Schatz
Oct 28, 2004·Clinical Immunology : the Official Journal of the Clinical Immunology Society·Silvina N ValdezEdgardo Poskus
Aug 1, 2000·Acta geneticae medicae et gemellologiae·M KrokowskiJ Bodalski

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