Duchess of Cornwall to celebrate JDRFs milestone anniversary with supporters

The Duchess of Cornwall, Camilla, will attend a reception gathering JDRF supporters and leading type 1 diabetes researchers to mark the charity’s 30th anniversary.
The world’s leading type 1 diabetes research charity is hosting the event to celebrate three decades of progress in developing treatments that improve the lives of people with type 1 diabetes.
Camilla, the president of JDRF UK, will attend on Wednesday 26 October 2016, along with a number of long-standing volunteers and supporters at London’s Guildhall.
She is expected to give a speech commending the hard work of JDRF-funded research scientists towards eradicating the autoimmune disease, which affects 400,000 people in the UK, including more than 29,000 children.
During the event, Karen Addingto, the charity’s UK chief executive, will also say a few words and there will be a presentation celebrating important scientific advances in type 1 diabetes research over the past 30 years.
Among other notable developments, their successful decade-long effort to get the artificial pancreas system approved by the FDA last month is likely to be the breakthrough on everyone’s lips.
Medtronic winning approval for the very first artificial pancreas in the United States has filled the diabetes community with hopen, wonder and joy.
It was Jeffrey Brewer, then a member of JDFR international board, who originally challenged JDRF to expedite the road to better tools until a cure is found.
Thanks to Brewer’s call to action, Medtronic is set to soon market the hybrid pump technology MiniMed 670G hybrid closed-loop system for use in people aged 14 and up.
Medtronic has plans for trials to win approval for children under that age in the near future as well.
In the wake of the FDA approval late last month, JDRF Chief Mission Officer, Aaron Kowalskin, said Medtronic hopes to have the system commercially available by the spring of 2017. And similar products – by many companies – are likely to win approval too.
JDRF’s work helped make this a reality by funding years ago the first trial at Yale that looked to prove an algorithm, which automates insulin delivery, could work in Medtronic’s system to maximise achievement of daily and nightly target glucose levels.
The hybrid system, which turns off when it detects lowering blood sugars, and ramps up insulin doses when it detects a trend toward high, is JDRF’s biggest achievement to date and will bring life-changing benefits to people with type 1 diabetes.