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Insulin Past, Present, and Future: 100 Years from the Leonard Thompson

Before the discovery of insulin and the critical role of the pancreas vis-à-vis diabetes mellitus pathophysiology, childhood diabetes or what we now call type 1 or autoimmune diabetes mellitus was almost universally fatal. In limited-resource countries (LRC) around the world, this remains sadly true because of the expense and unavailability of medical care, medical information, and/or medications. In 1889, Minkowski and Mering identified the pancreas as the likely source of the problem in pancreatectomized dog experiments, and Langerhans, working with Virchow, identified the islands of pancreatic tissue now named after Langerhans as the likely source of the problem. Prior to that, Cawley, Boucherdat, Zuelzer, Gley, de Meyer, Schafer, Scott, Kleiner, and Paulescu all worked on this problem with varying results until Banting, Best, MacLeod, and Collip in Toronto in 1921 successfully treated pancreatectomized dogs with an alcohol-based pancreatic extract and then were the first to do the same with children and adults with diabetes, starting with Leonard Thompson in early 1922. Urinary and blood glucose levels were reduced, and clinical symptoms decreased concurrently. The magnificent medical historical work by Professor Michael Bliss, also from Toronto, as well as an excellent US NPR Television documentary, describes the trials and tribulations of this event that culminated in the “fastest Nobel Prize” awarded. Progressive biopharmaceutical advances have modified insulin from pigs and cows and then genetically engineered insulin to work much faster and also much slower to provide more modernized ways of providing insulin. Insulin pens then replaced vial and syringe administration, and then insulin pumps coupled with continuous blood glucose sensors have made delivery more physiologic in addition to more attention paid to nutrition advice, education, and psychosocial support around the world. Programs to assist delivery of expensive insulin to LRC administered by Insulin for Life, Life for a Child (LFAC), Changing Diabetes in Children (CDIC) coupled with support by ISPAD (International Society for Pediatric and Adolescent Diabetes) have continued to make such advances available thorough wonderful philanthropy in insulin manufacturers and manufacturers of blood glucose monitoring equipment and insulin pump/sensor suppliers.