New research from the Children’s Diabetes Centre at The Kids Research Institute Australia has found children who use an insulin pump to manage their type 1 diabetes have better long-term blood glucose control than those on insulin injections.
The study, the largest and longest real-world follow-up of insulin regimens in children with type 1 diabetes, compared outcomes for 513 children using insulin pumps and a similar number of matched children using insulin injections.
Study lead Dr Marie-Anne Burckhardt said pump therapy was associated with a consistently lower HbA1c — a test that helps to determine how well a person is controlling their diabetes over time.
She said the higher the HbA1c levels, the greater the risk of diabetes-related complications and vice versa.
“The 0.4 percent (4 mmol) mean difference in HbA1c between the pump and injection cohorts is clinically significant, particularly in the context of long-term complications,” Dr Burckhardt said.
“The strength of this study is that it analyses ‘real-world’ outcomes of a large population-based cohort over a longer duration than previously reported.”
The study was recently published in the prestigious Pediatric Diabetes journal. Read the abstract here