Scientists strive to spare diabetics from the needle

New discoveries combined with noninvasive blood monitoring may lead to more people using insulin sooner, but a needle-free existence is still a long way off.

By Victoria Stagg Elliott, AMNews staff. Sept. 17, 2001.

The concept of injected insulin therapy could someday become a thing of the past.

Both the discovery of a new polymer that may allow for an effective insulin pill and positive clinical trial results for inhaled insulin have increased the hope that the needle could once and for all be eliminated for people with diabetes.

"There is a significant need for replacing the needles with some other way that would be less intrusive and less painful," said Nicholas A. Peppas, ScD, a professor of clinical and biomedical engineering at Purdue University, West Lafayette. He presented a paper on the polymer at last month's annual meeting of the American Chemical Society in Chicago.

He is not the first to take on this prickly challenge. But the decades-long hunt for alternative insulin delivery systems is littered with failures. Some have tried patches. Others have experimented with eye drops, suppositories, nasal sprays and skin implants. All have looked for the magic potion that could eliminate the needle, minimize patient discomfort and cut the amount of needles and sharps that end up in the waste stream.

"Don't hold your breath," said Philip Raskin, MD, director of the diabetes treatment center at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas.

No delivery system has quite worked out better than the trusty needle and syringe, which has been delivering insulin to people with diabetes since its discovery in the 1920s. Modern versions are much tinier, but they are basically the same. [...]