Duodenal Exclusion: Could it Be the Cure for Diabetes?

I watched as Shepard Smith of Fox News was interviewing Dr. Steven Garner about an "accidental cure" for diabetes. It seems that those who have undergone bypass surgery to help them lose weight, found an immediate side-effect to be a cure for their diabetes. Scientists were baffled at first by these findings and began to do more research. So far, all the results are much the same, even in people who are not obese. Now scientists are saying that instead of the pancreas being the problem for diabetics, it is actually their duodenum.

The duodenum is the first 12 inches of the small intestine. When this section of the intestine is bypassed, as in lap band or bypass surgery, the food does not pass through this section and as a result, the diabetes disappears sometimes in just a few days. They found that diabetes was cured long before sufficient weight was lost to cause such an impact.

After years and years of treating patients with insulin shots, and a variety of pills, after all the routine finger pricks and worrying about diet and exercise, after following all the guidelines put out by the American Diabetes Association, we are still not seeing anything that remotely resembles a cure for this insidious disease process. People are still dying from complications of diabetes, even when their blood sugar is well controlled. Clearly what is currently being done for this disease is not working.

Now, in light of the duodenal exclusion and their accidental findings, doctors and scientists are beginning to explore a new pathway to the cure for diabetes. Doctors around the world are already doing clinical trials and getting some pretty amazing results.

Conclusions from "The Annals of Surgery", November, 2006 - "This study shows that bypassing a short segment of proximal intestine directly ameliorates type 2 diabetes, independently of effects on food intake, body weight, malabsorption, or nutrient delivery to the hindgut. These findings suggest that a proximal intestinal bypass could be considered for diabetes treatment and that potentially undiscovered factors from the proximal bowel might contribute to the pathophysiology of type 2 diabetes."

The National Institutes of Health here in America, is currently recruiting participants for their clinical trials. Requirements are Diabetes Mellitus, Type 2, Insulin Resistance and Obesity. Participants will undergo duodenal exclusion plus omentectomy. This trial is sponsored by University of Campinas, Brazil.

Dr. Steven Garner says that instead of opening up a patient and performing a radical surgical procedure, they can place a tube that will allow food to simply bypass this portion of the intestine and thereby cure Diabetes. This tube would be put in place by sliding it down the throat and esophagus and would not require a surgical intervention.

This appears to be a new frontier in the treatment of a disease that has now reached epidemic proportions. It is time for all of us to watch closely as Scientists further explore this procedure as a real cure for Diabetes.