BOSTON -- A transplant surgery is beginning to make a difference for some of the sickest diabetes patients.
Sherri Szymanski had never known what it was like not to be diabetic -- until now.
"It's a juggling act. You have to juggle your insulin with how much you are going to eat with how much you're going to exercise. It's tough," said Szymanski, of Billerica, Mass.
Since the age of 4, Szymanski has had type 1 diabetes -- a disease that has taken a heavy toll on her body, including leaving her legally blind.
"It ruined my eyes first, and then it weakened the kidney veins to the point that I went to kidney failure," she said.
But after 33 years of living with diabetes, she received two gifts last year -- a healthy kidney from her father and a pancreas from a cadaver donor -- the organ that has essentially "cured" her diabetes. She no longer needs to test. No longer needs insulin. She can eat what she wants.
"It's amazing. It's like I'm a totally bionic woman. That's what I feel like, a bionic woman, a rebuilt woman," she said.
Surgeons started experimenting with pancreatic transplants about 15 years ago for those with severe diabetes. But it is a tricky operation, and even with advances in the technique today, about 10 percent of the time, it does not work.
"It's a very delicate organ and sometimes difficult to separate it from the fat that surrounds it. It can get damaged very easily," said Dr. Khalid Khwaja, of Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston.
Surgeons at the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center do about 10 combined kidney/pancreas transplants a year.
But there are downsides even when it does work -- patients need to take immune-suppressing drugs the rest of their lives. The organs are also in short supply.
"The surgeons tend not to accept whole organ pancreases from donors over the age of 40 or 45, or from people who are overweight because of the technical issues," Dr. Martha Pavlakis said.
Since receiving her pancreas in November, Szymanski has discovered much -- including her new favorite foods.
"I love chocolate. I can have a chocolate chip cookie if I want one. I feel like a new person," she said. "I lost tons of weight. I was a 12. I'm down to a 6 or a 4, depending on the pants."
While the new pancreas can't fix the vision damage already done by the diabetes, Szymanski does have a lot to look forward to.
"Just waking up every morning. Honestly, that's my high point. When I wake up every morning and I say, 'Thank you God for letting me wake up,'" she said.
Szymanski's doctors said that she should be diabetes-free as long as her pancreas holds out. A pancreas can last 10 to 20 years. After that, she could get another transplant.
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