Once known as the International House of Pancakes, IHoP now stands for Islet Homeostasis Protein. There is so much irony here that I just couldn’t pass up the opportunity to discuss.
People with type 1 diabetes typically lose both insulin and glucagon production. Both hormones are made in the pancreas (in the Islets of Langerhans*, clusters of endocrine cells); while insulin’s job is to lower blood glucose, glucagon raises it. Both actually have very important roles in glucose regulation in the human body.
Because people with type 1 diabetes no longer produce these hormones, we have to do all the regulating ourselves. Try as we might, however, it is not possible to achieve perfection (as the normally functioning human body can). Were we to visit IHOP and have a big stack of pancakes, we’d have to carefully calculate insulin doses and likely deal with crazy blood glucose levels the rest of the day.
Now scientists have discovered a protein in the glucagon-producing cells. They think this protein has a role in glucose regulation, because it is present in lab rodents and humans without diabetes, but it is not present in those with diabetes.
We’ll see where this research leads, but it’s exciting that we may have a new angle from which to approach things. One never knows…maybe a new angle will lead to something further.
*As an aside, I was fascinated to learn that Paul Langerhans discovered these pancreatic islets when he was 22! There is a trend in science right now to stop calling parts of the body names that reflect the people who discovered them. I really don’t have a problem with it. Give the guy a little credit!