So a little known treatment is changing
the lives of people living with diabetes.
And on this World Diabetes Day,
we're exploring an inhalable form
of insulin that's called Afrezza.
It's the only drug of its kind,
and it's been on the market
for more than seven years.
But patients and doctors alike tell us it
just doesn't have the name recognition.
Becca Habegger has the story.
I was diagnosed in 1983.
I was 13 years old.
That puts me at 38 years
living with type one diabetes.
Anthony Hightower,
his partner Lenny Santana.
I was diagnosed in 1999 and
their friend Matt Macedo.
I came late to the party.
I got diagnosed at
25. All have type one diabetes.
That could be a very lonely disease
if you don't have that support.
They're part of a Sacramento based.
Group called Duck Fire Beates,
which Anthony started years ago as
a team name for a cycling event.
And now, you know,
we have this community of diabetics
here locally in Sacramento.
And so we've hosted roller
skating parties, baseball games.
They tell other diabetics about a
medicine that has changed their lives.
But to understand how it works,
it's important to know this. Diabetes
is a condition where your pancreas
doesn't produce enough insulin,
Dr Adeela Ansari of Mercy
Medical Group explains.
We all need insulin to turn
blood sugar or glucose into
energy that fuels our bodies.
It is important
for your blood sugar to be at certain
range and if patients have diabetes,
it results in much higher level of
blood sugar which leads to long run,
more complication affecting your eyes,
your kidneys, nerves and high risk
of strokes and heart disease. There
are several types of diabetes and we won't
get into the specific differences here,
but generally type one patients have to
put insulin into their body every day
and some type 2 patients do as well.
The most common way by far is through
liquid insulin that can be taken
by injection or by using a pump.
Which involves an insulin dispenser connected
to a small tube placed just under the skin.
People who use insulin to control
their blood sugar levels take
extra around a meal or snack.
That's because the food will
raise their blood sugar level,
and they need the insulin to help
lower it back to a safe range.
But as Anthony explains,
figuring out the timing and
the dosage is complicated.
An injection, for me,
takes about 45 minutes to
an hour to start working,
which is very difficult.
If you're going out to eat,
you don't know what you're going to pick,
but yet you still have to
guess and count your carbs and.
Figure out what you're going
to have to take your insulin
based on those calculations,
and then 45 minutes to an hour later,
if your food's not ready,
you could be in trouble.
So now what a lot of people are
doing is they're just taking their
injections once their food is
there or right when they order it.
But at that point now you're dealing
with these high blood sugars
because you've already eaten,
but you've only taken your your
insulin just before you've eaten.
So now your blood sugars are sky
high for 45 minutes to an hour or so
before your insurance starts to kick in,
and then the traditional insulins
continue to work for them.
Three to five hours.
So now your food is out of your body,
your insulin is still working and
you're dropping below that low level.
So now you're feeling these post
meal hypoglycemic reactions.
Hypoglycemic reactions are when
your blood sugar drops below a
certain levels and it gives you this
feeling of like you're about to die.
But Matt, Anthony and Letty,
all of whom used liquid insulin
for years say that's not a
problem for them anymore.
They now use an insulin
delivery method that's inhaled.
It's the only one on the market
and it's been available for
more than seven years.
It's called afrezza.
Having the liquid insulin was
always a struggle and then
getting the medication just right.
Going from that to a frezza has
just been absolutely life changing.
It's been so freeing.
I would say it's absolutely life changing.
It's changed my life as far
as my diabetes is concerned.
Instead of having to calculate the exact
amount of liquid insulin to take based on
a guess of the amount of carbs in a meal,
a frezza comes in just three different doses.
We don't even count carbs.
I don't don't count carbs anymore.
I just see a meal and see small,
medium, large and dose accordingly.
That kind of just gives you a range.
As long as you're within this range,
you're fine. But a frezza is a whole
new way of thinking about insulin.
The biggest benefit, they say,
is how quickly Afrezza gets to work
and then gets out of their system.
You have a noticeable effect between
10 and 12 minutes. We can see it.
Because we all wear a thing called
the continuous glucose monitor,
and that goes in every
five minute increments.
So after about 3 dots or 15
minutes after you've inhaled,
you'll see a noticeable effect where
if you're starting to trend up,
it starts to level out and it
starts to go back down to the
level that you want it to be.
Liquid insulin is 4 hours out of your
system. Afrezza is out in 90 minutes.
The beauty of Frezza is
the speed in and speed out.
It's not necessarily that's inhaled.
To me, that's a bonus.
Now I actually take it when
my meal is delivered to me.
So while my food is now.
Digesting it out of my system,
my blood sugar is starting to level
out because a Fresno is leveling out.
I definitely can tell you it's a game
changer for patients.
Doctor Ansari says.
Afrezza is faster acting
because of how the inhaled
insulin is absorbed into the
bloodstream through the lungs.
The majority
of the injectable insulin are
delivered through capillary system,
which takes longer time to really
peak and stay longer in your system.
But when you look at the frezza,
it really delivers the incident directly
into the arterial blood system.
So it goes quickly into taking effect
very fast as opposed to the injectable.
Your dippin dots ice cream.
So like those freeze little pellets,
we freeze dry frozen nitrogen
and in monomeric form.
So as soon as you inhale in your lungs,
it releases the technology into your blood.
So there's not, there's no waste,
there's no time waiting for the
travel through your your tissue.
Michael Castagna is CEO of Mankind,
the company that makes Afrezza.
He says there are about 3000 doctors
throughout the US who prescribe Afrezza
and about 10,000 patients taking it,
a fraction of 1% of the people
who could potentially benefit,
about four million, 5 million
people who live with diabetes.
On insulin every day for
their meal time control.
So I asked him, this has been on
the market for some seven years.
People who use it call it life changing.
Why isn't it more widely used and known
about I would say 22 main things.
I've worked on this for five years now.
So. So it's it's first was the
company didn't have a lot of money so
therefore we couldn't raise awareness.
This is no large company,
although mankind has several
drugs in the pipeline.
Afrezza was its first on the
market with a second one that
launched just this summer.
I'd say the number one thing is the
majority of people do not know it.
And then the second one is doctors,
because they were trained
on injectable insulin,
they know injectable insulin.
We didn't train the US
doctors on inhaled insulin.
Doctors just don't believe it
sometimes and it's very frustrating.
I tell them to get your
own clinical experience.
Why wait?
And back I was just telling
you while watching this,
I'll be very honest,
did not know a lot about diabetes
and like just the mathematics behind
calculating what you need to take,
what you should take in your meal.
I mean that's a lot.
Yeah. No, OK. I mean, I have friends
and family members with diabetes,
but I'm not the one calculating
that insulin for them, you know,
so I too learned a lot from,
you know, Tony, Letty and Matt.
And you know, I, I we talked in
the stages of developing the story.
We don't want it to feel like a commercial
and really that's not the intention. I mean,
I came across the story really organically.
Tony, letty. From my neighbors.
Shout out to Tony and Letty at Halloween,
they were going and they're like,
don't worry. It's not.
It's not drugs or anything.
You're like, what is it?
It is a drug, actually.
It's insulin. Yeah.
And I said what?
And so they're telling me about it.
And once we learned that it was really,
there was not a lot of name recognition
and it changed their lives,
we thought, well.
And again,
it's the only one of its kind of the market.
Why not use this platform
to let folks know about it?
If someone has diabetes and
they're struggling to,
you know,
manage it,
maybe this is something
that could help them out.
And alternative. Yeah.
And we know other insulin can
be pricey. What about afrezza?
Yeah, Afrezza is also, you know,
that's a challenge for this drug as well.
The CEO does say there are
some options for customers.
He asks people just who are
interested to to reach out
and the CDC has said,
you know, diabetes is growing,
especially among kids. Are they?
Eligible to take a fresh as well.
They are not right now.
Afrezza has a pediatric
version in the pipeline,
but it's not quite ready
for to hit the market.
They're also hoping to create a
version for gestational diabetes
for women who are pregnant
and get diabetes.
So that too is
in the works. So of course,
we'll be following this. We have to.
Yeah. All right. Becca, thank you.