Thank you, Madam Chairperson.
Good morning.
I'd like to thank the committee for inviting JDRF to appear before you today during National Diabetes Awareness Month.
JDRF is the largest, not-for-profit charitable supporter of type 1 diabetes research globally. Founded in 1974, JDRF Canada has chapters located across Canada, and we are driven by passionate, grassroots volunteers, several of whom you are going to meet today.
The goal of JDRF research is to improve the lives of every person affected by type 1 diabetes by accelerating progress on the most promising opportunities for curing, better treating, and preventing the disease.
Today, JDRF has brought 40 young delegates from across Canada for our fourth Kids for a Cure Day. These remarkable kids are meeting with parliamentarians to share their type 1 diabetes story. They are among the more than three million Canadians who live with diabetes every day.
Type 1 diabetes is an autoimmune disease that occurs when the body's own immune system attacks and destroys the insulin-producing cells of the pancreas. This disease usually strikes in childhood and lasts a lifetime. Living with type 1 diabetes is a constant challenge from which there is no vacation.
The theme for this year's Kids for a Cure Day is “Living proof...a cure is within reach”. The stories of these children, some of whom you'll hear from in a moment, are nothing short of inspirational.
The history of diabetes research in Canada is, in every sense, a history of innovation. Over 90 years ago, Canada's Dr. Banting and Dr. Best gave the life-saving gift of insulin to the world. In 1999, a Canadian team of researchers accomplished a major breakthrough in islet cell transplantation, now known worldwide as the Edmonton protocol.
This committee has made the study of technological innovation in health care a priority. I want to share with you some of the significant and innovative technological advances in diabetes care being made right here in Canada and jointly supported by the Government of Canada and JDRF.
In 2009, the Government of Canada, through the Federal Economic Development Agency for Southern Ontario, committed $20 million as part of a $33.9 million partnership with JDRF to support the development of the JDRF Canadian clinical trial network in southern Ontario.
JDRF CCTN, as it is known, has assembled a team of highly experienced doctors, scientists, academia, and other clinical support professionals who currently are operating in 24 sites across Ontario. JDRF CCTN provides, for the first time in Canada, an independently funded and supervised platform for the clinical testing of new technology as it becomes available. JDRF CCTN has launched nine clinical trials and two technology projects focused around the artificial pancreas project, diabetes complications, immunology, and clinical care programs, and through this initiative has created in excess of 200 high-paying jobs in southern Ontario.
JDRF CCTN trials and studies provide reliable, evidence-based evaluations that establish not only the value of technology, but also contribute to safe implementation of these technologies within our community. This high quality, breadth, and depth of the JDRF CCTN studies will significantly stimulate adoption of drugs and devices by patients and clinicians, and will contribute to the development of evidence-based clinical practice guidelines.
The JDRFI artificial pancreas program represents a coordinated and collaborative effort to concentrate and focus resources on developing a closed-loop system that connects information from continuous glucose monitors with insulin pump delivery systems. Computer programs, or algorithms, digest all of the information and automatically give the correct signal to deliver proper amounts of insulin, depending on the circumstances of meal, activity, sleep, and so on. “Closed loop” refers to the fact that such systems can be automated, thereby markedly improving the quality of controlling blood sugar, the same way the pancreas does in people living without diabetes.
JDRF CCTN has approved studies that provide an ideal clinical platform to help advance the global APP effort. For example, Dr. Margaret Lawson, here at the Children's Hospital of Eastern Ontario, is leading a study of more than 100 individuals to determine if initiating continuous glucose monitoring at the same time as pump therapy in children and adolescents with established type 1 diabetes results in more sustained continuous glucose monitoring use compared to delaying CGM introduction until six months after pump initiation.
JDRF CCTN's trial focusing on CGM in women with type 1 diabetes in pregnancy is being led by Dr. Denice Feig from Mount Sinai Hospital in Toronto. This is the first global trial of continuous glucose monitoring in pregnancy. The primary objective of the study is to determine if real-time continuous glucose monitoring can improve glycemic control in women with type 1 diabetes who are pregnant or planning pregnancy. This trial is expected to set the standard for the use of this technology and to improve both fetal and maternal outcomes.
Dr. Bruce Perkins at the University Health Network is also using this technology to assess an algorithm that can detect impending hypoglycemia and stop the delivery of insulin, or the basal—