Pelham girl takes cause straight to the top: Camryn Adams makes case on type 1 diabetes with president

By CHRIS RUSSELL Bulletin Contributing Writer

Published on July 10, 2009

About three years ago, just before Camryn Adams turned 6, she was suddenly plagued with fatigue, weight loss and excessive thirst and urination.

A visit to the doctor discovered her blood sugar level was over 500, when it should be between 80 and 110. She was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes the same day.

"At first I really didn't know what the word (diabetes) meant," Camryn said. "The only part I recognized was 'die,' so I thought I was going to die, but that didn't happen."

Camryn, who is now 9 and will enter the fourth grade at Pelham Elementary School in the fall, said she has learned all about diabetes, including the origin of type 1 diabetes, also known as juvenile diabetes.

"The part of the pancreas that produces insulin is eaten away, and no one knows why that happens," she explained.

Insulin is a hormone that obtains glucose - a sugar and the body's main energy source - from the blood, and in doing so keeps blood sugar at a healthy level, needed for the body to function properly. Type 1 diabetics do not produce insulin; those with the other form of diabetes, type 2, produce insulin, but it is either in insufficient amounts or not recognized by the body.

Since she no longer produces insulin, Camryn needs a pump to supply her body with the hormone all day, everyday, or she - and all others suffering from type I diabetes - would die. Without insulin, the body cannot obtain enough glucose, forcing it to burn fats for energy, which eventually is fatal.

Camryn must check her blood sugar level eight to 10 times a day by pricking her finger and testing the blood with her pump. When her blood sugar is too low, she must consume something the body can easily turn into glucose, like fruit juice. When her blood sugar is too high, she must calculate the amount of insulin the pump should supply to lower it to a healthy level.

Camryn must check her blood sugar several times while at school, which attracts the curiosity of her classmates, most of whom don't fully understand what she is going through.

"One girl thinks I got diabetes from eating a lot of sugar, and she sees that I am in the paper and getting interviewed a lot, so I started seeing her coming to school with huge doughnuts," she said, exasperated. "But that's not how it works."

Camryn is not daunted by the disease. She enjoys horseback riding, biking and swimming, and was recently a delegate to the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation's Children's Congress, during which she met President Barack Obama. Camryn's mother, Barbara, accompanied her to Washington, and together they attended a congressional hearing on diabetes research and lobbied Sens. John Kerry and Edward Kennedy, both D-Mass., to push for health-care reform and to renew the federal Special Diabetes Program, which allocated $1.59 billion for type 1 diabetes research between 1998 and 2011.

Health-care reform is a very personal issue for Camryn and her family, as their health insurance will not provide her a continuous glucose monitor, a device placed under the skin which automatically checks the blood-sugar level every five minutes and radios it to the pump. With the monitor, Camryn would not have to prick her finger or worry about constantly having enough testing strips, but the insurance company considers it a "luxury item" and thus will not cover it.

Barbara disagrees with the insurance company's categorization of the monitor. "As if anything having to do with diabetes is a luxury item," she said.

Although frustrated by being denied currently available technology, both mother and daughter are grateful for the insulin pump, without which Camryn would have to receive shots of insulin from a needle at least five times a day.

Needle injected insulin is the only option if one's health insurance does not cover an insulin pump, which, to Barbara, is evidence of diabetes's severity.

"Giving kids who can't stand a flu shot once a year five to seven shots a day - that's an intense disease," she said.

Camryn and Barbara realize that diabetes research costs hundreds of millions of dollars, inducing them to raise money through events sponsored by the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation. Since 2006, they have raised more than $35,000 for the Western Massachusetts Walk to Cure Diabetes, which takes place every year at Six Flags New England in Agawam. Anyone who donates more than $50 to Camryn's team will receive free admission to the park on the day of the walk, Oct. 18.

They know the money will be put toward important research, including financing development of an artificial pancreas, which will automatically provide a constant amount of insulin; it is still being tested. Barbara said she raises money for research in the hope Camryn will be wearing one when she leaves for college.

The ultimate goal is to find a cure though, which they are hoping for in the next several decades. "We're so close," Barbara said.