A Bitter Sweet Tale

Treatment with insulin turns the deadly disease of type 1 diabetes into a condition most people survive but the cost is still high therefore our ultimate goal is to prevent diabetes. The words “laboratory test” don’t really inspire excitement but Anna will consider why these not-so-simple measurements are vital to the study and prevention of type 1 diabetes. We’ll discuss why we need to be able to predict who will develop diabetes? When we can accurately predict disease? And how we can improve laboratory tests to further this goal?

We all know that obesity is driving up the incidence of type 2 diabetes and this is a major health concern for the UK but why should we care about the “other type(s)” of diabetes? Kathleen will discuss the different kinds of diabetes that occur in the first year of life. In some cases the underlying causes have been identified but controversy still remains. Come and find out about the importance of early life events in type 1 diabetes and hear some intriguing ideas about why children with Down’s syndrome often develop diabetes.