Review Article

emerging findings. Pediatric Diabetes 2014: 15: 1–9. Type 1 diabetes (T1D) is considered an autoimmune disease, pre-dominantly mediated by autoreactive T cell responses, which over time leads to the destruction of pancreatic beta cells and insulin deficiency. Symptoms often appear in childhood or adolescence, but the disease can develop in adult patients as well (1). Both therapeutic management and clinical outcomes have dramatically improved during the last few decades, yet T1D remains a major cause of suffering, a burden to society, and its incidence appears to be increasing, especially in younger children (2). Although we can identify individuals at increased risk among patients’ relatives, the disease cannot be prevented and there is no definitive cure (3). Pancreas and islet transplantation can restore insulin independence, at least for a period of time, but are not universally available and require chronic immunosuppression (4)