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Basic research and clinical application of islet transplantation: Current status and future prospects

Type 1 diabetes mellitus is a chronic autoimmune disease. Although treatment with insulin is effective in most patients with type 1 diabetes mellitus, it can result in severe hypoglycemia which can be even deadly in some patients. Beta cell replacement, which can be achieved by whole pancreas transplantation or isolated islet cell transplantation, is usually used to restore physiologic glucose homeostasis. Compared with pancreas transplantation, islet transplantation has certain advantages. However, there was not a great breakthrough in islet transplantation until 2000 when the Edmonton protocol was published. However, some investigators believe that progressive graft loss and lack of reproducibility are fatal flaws of the Edmonton protocol. Thus, the protocol needs some improvements. In this article, we briefly describe the Edmonton protocol and its improvements and review the current status and future prospects of islet transplantation.