How the Patch Could Be a Breakthrough for Insulin Delivery

Insulin may be a life-saving medicine for people with diabetes who require it, but there's usually no love lost for the injections needed to take insulin.

A new insulin patch could one day help people with diabetes better control their blood sugar levels -- although it's still a few years away from reaching the commercial market.

[Read: 6 Ways to Save Money on Your Diabetes Medications.]

The "smart" insulin patch, as it's often called, was developed by Zhen Gu, an associate professor with the Joint Department of Bioengineering at University of North Carolina--Chapel Hill and North Carolina State University.

The dime-sized patch would be worn on the skin and release insulin as you need it. The patch in its current form has microneedles that are thinner than a human hair and are filled with insulin and an enzyme called glucose oxidase, which helps the body release insulin in response to high glucose levels.

"The patch is painless and very tiny," Gu says. "It can quickly reduce blood sugar and reduce the risk for hypoglycemia." If you have diabetes, then you know about the constant balancing act of avoiding blood sugar that's too high or too low.

"This patch hopefully will make it easier for patients to take their insulin without the fear of pain from pricking themselves," says Mohamed Jalloh, a pharmacist in the San Francisco area and a spokesperson for the American Pharmacists Association. He says it's common for patients to not take insulin until their blood sugar readings are too high or low because they don't want to feel the pain of an injection or they aren't comfortable using needles.

"It also looks like the patch will automatically release insulin based upon a person's blood sugar values. This will be a breakthrough since this would eliminate the tedious task of checking blood sugar values before and/or after eating," Jalloh says.

It also could help with the tricky task of managing insulin dosing, says endocrinologist Dr. Susan E. Spratt, an associate professor of medicine and assistant professor in the Department of Community and Family Medicine at Duke University School of Medicine in Durham, North Carolina. For example, say you typically use 12 units of insulin on active days and 15 units on days when you're not as active -- but say you have a day where you're not sure how active you'll be. "You could give yourself 12 units and if you need more, the insulin patch could give you the rest," she says.

The patch could also potentially help if carbohydrate counting is tricky, which Spratt has seen in patients with learning problems, dementia, stroke or blindness. "Someone could give you a basal shot in the morning and place the patch, and then you could eat and the patch would decide how much insulin you needed," she says.

[See: The 12 Best Diets to Prevent and Manage Diabetes.]

Another potential advantage of the patch concept is managing both the dosing and timing issues involved with insulin, says endocrinologist Dr. Elena Toschi of Joslin Diabetes Center in Boston. "Insulin has a narrow therapeutic range," she says. However, with a patch, the insulin would, in theory, be delivered exactly when it is needed.

Automated insulin delivery with a patch could also help diabetics avoid the dosing challenges currently posed by syringes in different volumes and unit measures. "Patients may draw the wrong amount by changing their syringe," Jalloh says.

Despite the patch's potential, diabetes experts naturally have a few more questions about it.

"The technology is expected to work well during rising glucose levels but might or might not work well with falling glucose levels. This remains to be seen," says Dr. David Klonoff, medical director of the Diabetes Research Institute at the Mills-Peninsula Medical Center in San Mateo, California. "Also, there can't be any leaking of insulin when the blood sugar is low or there could be resulting hypoglycemia."

As the patch continues to be developed, Klonoff would like to know how the varied needs for glucose in each patient will be addressed. "One patient might need an extra unit of insulin for every 25 mg/dl of glucose rise, and another might need an extra unit for every 50 mg/dl of glucose rise. How can the technology be tuned for an individual's sensitivity like a pen or pump?" Klonoff says.

Jalloh also speculates about whether the patch could lead to redness or swelling in the area where it is worn. "This is a concern for any topical patch and wouldn't be limited to insulin patches only," he says.

That said, if Gu and his research team work out answers to some of the questions surrounding the patch, Klonoff also believes the smart insulin patch could be a breakthrough in the automatic delivery of insulin.

[Read: 11 Tips for Testing Your Blood Sugar at Home.]

Gu's work with the patch began in 2012. Testing in mouse models with Type 1 diabetes found that the patch lowered blood sugar levels for up to nine hours. It will be useful to see how the patch performs in larger animals and humans, Toschi says.

It will take a few years for the patch to go through human testing and, if successful, get approved for use in humans -- Klonoff predicts that could take at least five years. Earlier this summer, Gu's company that makes the patch, Zenomics, received a $5.8 million investment from MicroPort Scientific to help continue the development of the patch. Previously, Gu and his team were awarded $1.625 million from the Pathway to Stop Diabetes initiative from the American Diabetes Association.

Vanessa Caceres is a Health freelancer for U.S. News. She's a nationally published health, travel and food writer, and she has an undergraduate degree in journalism and psychology from Hampshire College and a graduate degree in linguistics/bilingual education from Georgetown University. Connect with her on Twitter at @FloridaCulture.