JAIPUR: The tedium and pain of daily injections of insulin may soon be over if a recent reported methods of oral delivery of insulin is successfully materialized.
Insulin contains proteins which when taken orally are broken down by the protein-digesting enzymes in the intestines. Therefore, to retain the protein structure, insulin is repeatedly injected under the skin, which is not only tedious but also leads to atrophy of the skin fat cells at the site of the injections.
Now, an ingenious method of oral delivery of insulin has been reported by Dr. ¥ W Cho from Perth and M Flyn from Middlesex in the British medical journal “Lancet”.
The researchers coated microscopic droplets of insulin in water with carefully selected oily substances, by a process known as emulsification. To each of these oil-coated droplets, they added a chemical substance that can inhibit the action of protein-breaking enzymes.
The microscopic emulsion was placed inside a hard gelatin capsule which remains unaffected by the gastric juice and is dissolved only in the distal intestine,
Proteinanceous substances are normally broken down by digestive enzymes into very small chemical molecules that can diffuse through the lining membrane of the intestines directly into the blood.
Unlike them, fatty substances are kicked up as droplets by a special set of vessels called lymphatic vessels. The fat-coated insulin droplets can thus enter the body unharmed by the digestive enzymes.
The new method of oral delivery has been successfully tried on three patients after encouraging results from animal experiments, the Lancet report says.
In these three volunteers, who were earlier taking insulin injections several times a day, the diabetes remained under control.
Article extracted from this publication >> February 23, 1990
