Studies have shown abnormal brain function in children with type 1 diabetes

, led by researchers at Stanford University School of Medicine, showed that children with type 1 diabetes had small but important differences in brain function compared to children without the disease.
The study, published online December 9 in PLOS Medicine, is the first to assess the brain condition of children with diabetes in cognitive tasks. In functional magnetic resonance imaging scans, when their brains were working, diabetic children showed a range of abnormal patterns of brain activity, which have been found in many other diseases, including cognitive decline in aging, concussion, attention deficit hypermorphosis, and multiple sclerosis.
The study also reported that abnormal patterns of brain activity were more pronounced in children with longer periods of diabetes.
Dr Laura Flanders-Ross, senior research assistant at Stanford's Interdisciplinary Brain Science Research Centre, said: "Our findings suggest that the brains of children with type 1 diabetes are not as efficient as expected. Flanders-Ross shared the paper with lead author Bruce Buckingham, M.D., an honorary professor of pediatrics at Stanford University.
Dr Alan Rice, senior author of the study and professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Stanford University, said: "Our study concluded that despite a lot of attention from endocrinologists and real improvements in clinical guidelines, children with diabetes are still at risk of learning and behavioural problems associated with their disease. "
blood sugar affects brain developmenttype 1 diabetes occurs when the pancreas is unable to produce insulin, a hormone that helps regulate blood sugar. The patient obtains insulin by injection or insulin pump. But even with treatment, their blood sugar levels (the main sugars in the blood) fluctuated much more than those of healthy people.
“ In children with diabetes, blood sugar levels fluctuate over time, and glucose is important for brain development," Flanders-Ross said. Early studies have revealed changes in brain structure and mild performance disorders in children with type 1 diabetes, but their mechanisms have never been studied. It is important to functionally capture what is happening in these children's brains.researchers performed functional magnetic resonance imaging brain scans on 93 children with type 1 diabetes recruited in five locations: Nemur Children's Health System in Jacksonville, Florida; Stanford University; Washington University in St. Louis; University of Iowa and Yale. Another 57 children who did not have the disease formed a control group. All participants were 7-14 years old. Standard behavioral and cognitive tests are performed on all children prior to brain scans.
Then, in a functional magnetic resonance imaging scanner, the children performed a cognitive task called "go/no": different letters in the alphabet were displayed in random order, and participants were asked to press a button in response to each letter except "ten", a task often used in brain scan studies to assess what happens in the brain when participants concentrate.
The study found that although children with diabetes performed their tasks as accurately as those in the control group, their brains behaved differently. In children with diabetes, the default mode of the network, the brain's idle system, is not turned off during the task. To compensate for the abnormal activation of the default mode network, the brain executive control network, which is responsible for self-regulation and concentration, works harder than normal in children with diabetes.
These abnormalities are more pronounced in children diagnosed with diabetes at a young age, suggesting that the problem may worsen over time.
“ The longer you are exposed to dynamic changes in blood sugar levels, the greater the change in brain function relative to the default pattern network," Flanders-Ross said. She added that studies of adult diabetics have shown that the brain eventually loses the ability to compensate for the problem later in life.
Next: The effects of the test
next, scientists want to study whether better blood sugar levels through closed-loop artificial pancreatic therapy are beneficial to children's brain function. These devices electronically couple blood glucose sensors with insulin pumps that automatically regulate insulin delivery.
"We hope that with the improvement of diabetes treatment devices, these findings will either be less severe or disappear," Rice said. She added that as blood sugar control improves, children's brains may be able to resume normal activity. Young brains have the most plasticity and repair potential," he said, "but if brain function problems persist, children also have a long time to endure these consequences." ”（cyy123.com）