Pregnancy poses additional risks for women with diabetes as hormonal changes make it very difficult to keep blood glucose levels within a safe range, especially at night. As a result of high blood glucose levels, babies of women with diabetes are five times as likely to be stillborn, three times as likely to die in their first months of life and twice as likely to have a major deformity. Hypoglycaemia (low blood glucose) in pregnancy is a major cause of mortality in women and two in three mothers with pre-existing diabetes have Type 1 diabetes.

The study evaluated the performance of an artificial pancreas or ‘closed-loop insulin delivery system’ in ten pregnant women with Type 1 diabetes. The researchers found the device was able to automatically provide the right amount of insulin at the right time, maintain near normal blood glucose levels and, in turn, prevent nocturnal hypoglycaemia in both early and late pregnancy.

The artificial pancreas was created by combining a continuous glucose monitor (CGM) with an insulin pump, both of which are already used separately by many people with Type 1 diabetes. Previous studies have shown improved blood glucose control and reduced hypoglycaemia with overnight use of an artificial pancreas in children with Type 1 diabetes but this is the first time it has been successfully used in pregnant women with the condition.

For women with Type 1 diabetes, self-management is particularly challenging during pregnancy due to physiological and hormonal changes. Previous studies indicate that pregnant women with the condition spend an average of ten hours a day with glucose levels outside the recommended target. These high blood glucose levels increase the risk of congenital malformation, stillbirth, neonatal death, preterm delivery, macrosomia (oversized babies) and neonatal admission.

All of which makes this discovery of great potential benefit in terms of both saving, and improving the quality of life. This was only a small scale study so what is now needed is an extension to test larger numbers of women. Then to be able to take it out of the hospital and in to the home setting where it will be most valuable.

Now bone mass is a measure of bone strength and Dr. Norman Pollock, bone biologist at MCG’s Georgia Prevention Institute, has confirmed that this study is the first to suggest the association between weaker bones and type 2 diabetes risk in children.

Type 2 is the most common form of diabetes in adults and sadly it is now becoming more common in children as it is often associated with being overweight and taking little exercise.   The study has just been published in the Journal of Bone and Mineral Research and according to. Dr. Pollock “while overweight children may have more bone mass than normal-weight kids, it may not be big, or strong enough, to compensate for their larger size.”

Though of course it is not the case that everyone who is overweight has weak bones, Dr. Pollock feels it may have more to do with how fat is distributed throughout the body. For instance pre-diabetics tend to have more fat around their abdominal area, specifically visceral fat, a type of fat deep in the belly that is linked to diabetes and cardiovascular disease.

In this study, higher amounts of visceral fat were associated with lower bone mass while more body fat overall was associated with higher bone mass. “Taken together, it seems that excessive abdominal fat may play a key role linking pre-diabetes to lower bone mass,” Pollock said.

The good news is that children — or more accurately their parents — have time to fix this problem which can have the potential for lifelong health consequences.  Two of the simplest solutions are to engage children in regular exercise that can be maintained because they enjoy it and will continue it into adulthood and to pay real attention to their diet.

If parents truly want to enhance bone strength and ultimately reduce the risk of osteoporosis during childhood, then these two simple measures will not only improve their health but research has shown it can also improve their ability to learn.