Type 1 diabetes is caused by the patient’s own immune system destroying insulin-producing cells in the pancreas.
The researchers, from the University of Sao Paulo, gave the patients powerful drugs to suppress their immune systems in an attempt to stop further destruction of pancreatic cells.
This was followed by transfusions of stem cells taken from their own blood, in effect designed to restart the immune system.
Some patients reacted more quickly to the treatment than others, and the length of the effect also varied. One patient was able to survive without insulin injections for 35 months, and four others for at least 21 months.
