Transplanting the Islets of Langerhans for a Diabetes Cure

In a public elementary school, my classmates and I were incorrectly taught that the "Isles of Langerhans" were 2 sizable glands that sit on the underside of the pancreas. During the same year, we were taught (from textbooks with the matching pictures) that ALL men have one fewer rib on their left sides, because Eve came from the side of Adam. Also during the same year, we were taught that the kiwi bird was extinct. None of these things were true. Since so many people are gadding about in costumes this week, I keep imagining a skeleton holding a stuffed kiwi and examining fictitious organs in a jar from a particular Twilight Zone episode.

The islets are not two glands but several clusters of cells throughout the pancreas that account for about 1-2% of its makeup. I wonder how it was felt that the islets were glands when no glands appear on the dorsal side of the pancreas; and all the rest of it we were taught? This all speaks to the lack of science education for teachers at the elementary grades level.

Futurist writer Harlan Ellison® has a web page dedicated to him called Islets of Langerhans, perhaps to point out the ludicrous fallacies we're taught, but certainly to point out the sugar-coating the media placed on news items they have wished to bury in the 1970s unto today (one of Ellison's missions being top remove that coating).

The cell clusters in the pancreas produce insulin. A pancreas implant, usually paired with a kidney transplant in a diabetic human beyond all other hope, can cure Type I and Type II Diabetes -- In the film Repo Men, computerized artificial pancreases did the trick. Further, transplanting a large number of Islets of Langerhans from a donor pancrease can produce positive results and clinical trials are gathering additional research in order to perfect these techniques.

NIDDK reports that the islets of Langerhans may be successfully transplanted. In clinical trials, a massive number of islets are extracted from an organ donor's pancreas and implanted into a patient suffering Type I Diabetes.

After a certain time period, the beta cells within the islets begin to produce insulin. Research has been collected regarding this set of procedures since 2000 or earlier, but the procedures may have been conceptualized in the 18th or 19th Centuries. Research is pointing to the fact that at least 1,000,000 islets are required to take the place of daily injections of insulin, and examining the success of artificial membranes to hold the islets in a sort of bioengineered pancreas, and the efficacy of transplanting pig islets.

See the links below for references and entire articles.

The above articles and additional research pieces suggest that even after a successful transplant of islets, the pancreas can be affected adversely by unwise health choices, such as ingesting too much alcohol, smoking, and the usual obesity and lack of exercize. It would be possible to have Type I Diabetes, be cured by an Islets of Langerhans implantation, and then to develop Type II Diabetes. As the film Repo Men tells us, transplatation is not enough, but is best a part of a healthy life in which wiser choices are made.