History of Diabetes
Timeline of Diabetes History

The history of diabetes may help those who suffer from it understand how treatments have evolved through the years. This information may help someone understand diabetes symptoms, diabetes treatments, and the differences in the diabetes types. So sit back and enjoy this diabetes timeline by yourself or with a loved one.

In the First Century B.C. – Diabetes received its name from a Greek physician, Aretaeus of Cappadocia, after the word dia-bainein which means “to siphon”. This was related to the patients passing excessive amounts of urine.

In ancient times – Indians would call diabetes “sweet urine disease” because they tested for it by observing whether ants were attracted to the persons urine or not.

1425 – The word diabete was first recorded in an English medical text, to cement the history of diabetes.

1675 – English physician Dr. Thomas Willis describes the sugar taste of urine in people with diabetes.

1750 – Cullen, a scientist, adds mellitus – Latin to mean “honey-sweet” to the term diabetes.

1869 – Paul Langerhans describes the islet cells of the pancreas.

1900 – Based on animal research, Drs. Joseph von Mering and Oskar Minkowski discovered that the pancreas plays a role in diabetes.

1901 – Eugene Opie links diabetes with islet cells, which are clusters of cells in the pancreas that make insulin. Not yet understanding it but this is will best help type one diabetes patients.

1920 – R.D. Lawrence develops the dietary exchange system which helped to develop a diet for diabetes.

1921 – Frederick Banting and Charles Best discover insulin as a diabetes medication.

1922-1923 – Frederick G Banting of Canada and John J.R. Macleod of the United Kingdom win the Nobel Prize for their discovery of insulin, after using it in the first patients for diabetes treatment to go down in the history of diabetes.

1936 – Sir Harold Percival Himsworth distinguished diabetes type 1 and 2.

1936 – PZI (Protamine Zinc Insulin) veterinary insulin used on animals is a combination of pork/beef derived insulin or beef-derived insulin.

1936 – NPH (Neutral Protamine Hagedorn) was created by adding neutral protamine to regular insulin.

1942 – The first sulfonylurea is identified as an anti-diabetic drug to help manage type 2 diabetes.

1952 – Lente insulin was created using zinc – a natural component of the body to obtain the best effects without the use of protamine.

1956 – Oral medications of sulfonylurea were developed for people with type 2 diabetes.

1961 – Becton-Dickinson markets a single use syringe treatments for diabetes.

1969 – Ames Diagnostics creates the first portable blood glucose meter to help monitor the different types of diabetes.

1977 – The radioimmunoassay for insulin is discovered by Rosalyn Yalow and Solomon Berson.

1979 – The hemoglobin A1C test is created for the precise measurement of blood sugar control.

1979 – The Derma-Ject needle-free insulin delivery system is marketed by The Derata Corporation.


1988 – Dr. Gerald Reaven identifies metabolic syndrome, which is a combination of medical disorders that increase the risk of a diabetes diagnosis.

1992 – Lispro is tested, by Eli Lilly, as a diabetes medication.

1993 – The Diabetes Control and Complications Trial concludes that the best diabetes management is "tight control."

1995 – Precose and Metformin are approved for use to help with type 2 diabetes symptoms.

2007 – Diabetes patients are treated with stem cells from their own bone marrow and showed that most of the patients no longer required insulin treatments for extended periods of time.

With this history of diabetes you can see there has been much progress in medicine to try help those who suffer from it. Perhaps the future diabetes timeline will be one with a cure.

Return to top of History of Diabetes page/ Facts about Diabetes/ /History of Diabetes/ Statistics/ Diabetes A1c Test/ Prediabetes/ Diabetes Types/ Type 1 Diabetes/ Type 2 Diabetes/