Hi Curleous
Your consultant might be very “up beat” regarding Lantus – but has he/she actually used this particular synthetic analogue insulin?! :lol:
Please also don’t be “deeply apprehensive” regarding trying another type of insulin – after all health professionals don’t even consider the potential impact changing an insulin has for a user when the health professionals are being seduced by drug companies.
There have been horrific anecdotal accounts of insulin users being herded into a clinic in groups at a time & being presented with a box of Lantus and being informed “your insulin is changing and here is the new stuff”. :shock: :shock:
I have tried over my 39 year diabetic career many types of insulin – some very good, some ok and some positively ghastly.
It is also worth noting that although there are now 3 types of insulin available in the UK at present the actual choice within each type particularly animal insulin & human synthetic insulin has diminished rapidly. :shock:
Within each type there are a variety of insulin’s, which differ in the way they act and/or how long they last known as the action profile.
One slight snag is that the action profile in theory and on paper can often be very different when the insulin is injected into a living human – thus why some insulin’s just do not work for some users. :shock:
Animal Insulin
Human Synthetic Insulin
Genetically Modified (GM) Synthetic Analogues.
Animal insulin is extracted from the pancreases of dead pigs (Porcine / Pig Insulin) and cattle (Bovine / Beef Insulin). Following extraction they are highly purified. Animal insulin is the oldest type of insulin in use.
However……in the 1920’s to overcome the shortage of beef insulin whale (as in the large mammals that swim in the sea not the country) insulin was also manufactured. :shock:
Examples in use in the UK today: Short acting - Hypurin Porcine (Pig) & Bovine (Beef) Neutral Insulin.
Medium / Long acting - Hypurin Porcine (Pig) & Bovine (Beef) Isophane Insulin, Hypurin Bovine Lente & Hypurin Bovine Protamine Zinc Insulin (PZI).
:idea: Bovine (Beef) animal insulin is one of the gentlest insulin available.
Human Synthetic Insulin is not extracted from dead humans!
It is made in the laboratory using recombinant DNA technology based on the DNA structure of insulin that human pancreases secrete.
Human insulin is grown in the lab inside common bacteria. The bacteria Escherichia coli or E-Coli is by far the most widely used type of bacterium, but yeast cells are also used.
Human synthetic insulin was developed to make insulin more available world wide.
There were concerns that the supply for insulin globally would outstrip the supply of animal insulin, which has in fact not happened.
Examples in use in the UK today: Short acting – Actrapid, Humalin S, Insuman Rapid.
Medium/Long acting – Insulatard, Humulin I, Insuman Basal.
GM Synthetic Analogues
The newest kids on the block! Manufactured in the laboratory by modifying the chemical structure of human synthetic insulin so that the resulting compound has different chemical properties to human synthetic insulin. Insulin analogues are therefore man made or artificial products cultivated from deactivated e-coli or bakers yeast cells.
Examples in use in the UK today: Rapid acting - Apidra, Novorapid, Humalog.
Long acting - Lantus, Levemir.
In theory and on paper the GM synthetic analogues Lantus & Levemir look fantastic – the idea is that their profile mimics functioning pancreas / beta cells by providing basal (background) insulin with a flat profile – insulin users would then only be required to inject one basal injection a day and inject an rapid acting analogue such as Apidra, Novorapid or Humalog when they eat.
After injecting into subcutaneous tissue, Lantus for example forms a depot of insulin, of which small amounts are meant to slowly move into the bloodstream. Levemir on the other hand attaches itself to albumin in the blood and as the blood circulates it releases the insulin. I have made this extremely simple as actually its a tad more complicated than that!
:idea: Synthetic analogue insulin is the most aggressive insulin available.
Insulin is like a string of beads and the way in which the beads are linked together and more significantly how they come apart denotes the mode of action for each of the respective types thus some insulin’s begin acting very quickly after injecting and other insulin’s take longer to work.
Some insulin are combined so the short acting & the longer acting component of the insulin are mixed together.
:idea: Human synthetic insulin & GM analogues have differences in their amino acid structure whilst animal insulin – particularly porcine (pig) insulin has the nearest amino acid structure to human (non synthetic) insulin.
If you want to do some more reading the following are useful:
Insulin – A Voice For Choice by Arthur Teuscher.
Type 1 Diabetes in children, adolescents & young people by Dr Ragnar Hanas (don’t be put off by the title cos I have a copy of my book shelf and its very useful.
Using Insulin by John Walsh and others – ditto as above.
There is a humongous amount of information to learn when diagnosed with diabetes so I hope the above has helped rather than confuse you.
Best wishes
Txx