Mayor Jane Campbell, several area researchers and research volunteers announced at Cleveland City Hall the launch of a major drive to enroll volunteers in a new national diabetes study.

The researchers from CWRU's School of Medicine and six clinical sites in Cleveland say they will test promising approaches to lowering the risk of heart disease and stroke in adults with type 2 diabetes. CWRU is the base for the Ohio-Michigan network, one of seven areas involved in North America.

Currently, about 200,000 people in Northeast Ohio have type 2 diabetes and the number is expected to double in 20 years, said Saul Genuth, the principal investigator of the Ohio-Michigan network of the Action to Control Cardiovascular Risk in Diabetes (ACCORD) study. He called type 2 diabetes an invisible epidemic. Often people with the disorder do not know they have it or are unaware of the health consequences associated with it.

People with type 2 diabetes die of cardiovascular disease at rates two to four times higher than those who do not have diabetes, and they experience more nonfatal heart attacks and strokes. At the announcement, he referred to a graph showing number of deaths caused by cancer, heart disease and stroke decreasing, with death caused by diabetes increasing. He said the increase in diabetes would adversely affect the heart disease and stroke death rate.

"Twenty to 30 percent of all coronary artery disease is accounted for by type 2 diabetes," he said.

The clinical sites in Greater Cleveland-University Hospitals of Cleveland (UHC) and Cleveland Clinic Foundation being the largest-seek about 1,000 adults with type 2 diabetes to volunteer for this study. Participants will receive all medication and treatments related to the study free of charge. Participants will continue to see their current personal physician for all their other health care needs.

One of the participants who began in an early phase of the trial, Al Brent, a local real estate broker, praised how being in the study has improved his health and he felt the risks of volunteering for this study were minimal because no new experimental drugs were involved and all medicines and care were handled through one's own family doctor.

Type 2 diabetes, previously called adult onset or non-insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus, is a disorder in which the muscle and fat cells do not use insulin properly. Type 2 diabetes occurs most often in people who are older, overweight, physically inactive and have a family history of diabetes. It is also more common in African Americans, Hispanics and Native Americans. Some Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders also are at particularly high risk for type 2 diabetes, and it is seen in women with a history of diabetes during pregnancy.

Speaking on behalf of the Center for Science, Health and Society, Nathan A. Berger, director, said, " The ACCORD trial is exactly the kind of study we expect will enhance research and education programs at Case Western Reserve University and simultaneously improve the standards of care and health status of Cleveland."

The study will continue until 2009. Most participants can expect to be involved from five to eight years. Volunteers with type 2 diabetes will be tested to determine if they are eligible. Participants selected will receive all their blood glucose treatment from ACCORD physician-investigators. They will be assigned to either a blood fat or blood pressure study group and will receive their cholesterol or high blood pressure care from the same physician-investigator.

In addition to UHC and CCF, the clinical sites in Cleveland are: St. Vincent Charity Hospital, Louis Stokes Cleveland Veterans Affairs Medical Center, Your Diabetes Endocrine Nutrition Group, LLC (Mentor, Oh.), and University Suburban Health Center (S. Euclid, Oh.). The $250 million national study—with about $30 million for the Ohio-Michigan network—is funded by the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute, part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases and the National Eye Institute, both part of the NIH, are providing additional support to the study.

Interested CWRU employees can learn more about the study and can enroll by calling (216) 368-1314. More information about the ACCORD study can be found on the Web at http://www.accordtrial.org. Information about diabetes can be found at www.niddk.nih.gov and http://www.netwellness.org.