For years, Pamela Bowman's diabetes was so severe that even five insulin injections a day didn't prevent her from suddenly passing out without warning.

        Now, the 42-year-old Otway, Ohio, woman is looking forward to a life without insulin shots.

        She recently received an islet cell transplant from Cincinnati's University Hospital, one of only five Americans to undergo the procedure this year.

        “I feel great,” Ms. Bowman said. “This was kind of a second chance for me.”

        The transplant was performed Nov. 16. Hospital officials say it is an alternative to pancreast transplants to cure diabetes.

        Diabetes, the fourth most deadly disease in the United States, is caused when the pancreas fails to produce enough insulin. It is the nation's leading cause of kidney failure, blindness and limb amputations. Islet cells in the pancreas produce insulin.

        Ms. Bowman was diagnosed with Type I, or juvenile, diabetes when she was 10. Her rare form, called “hypoglycemic unaware” diabetes, prevents her from sensing when her blood sugar levels crash, which happens several times a day.

        “One minute I'd be normal. Then I wouldn't be there anymore,” she said.

        Most diabetics don't get pancreas transplants until their kidneys fail and they get both organs transplanted at the same time. But Ms. Bowman's troubles were considered life-threatening.

        The process began with the death of a 54-year-old who had elected to donate his organs.

        Dr. Horacio Rilo, an islet cell expert recruited to join UC last year, did the technical work. His lab processed the donated pancreas into liquid, filtered out the islet cells and mixed them into an IV solution. Other surgeons made a 2 1/2-inch incision above Ms. Bowman's navel, and injected the solution into the portal vein, which leads to the liver.

        The islet cells soon lodged in the liver and started producing insulin as if the liver were also a pancreas.

        Most patients go home within 24 hours, and the procedure is about 60 percent cheaper than a pancreas transplant, hospital officials said.

        For people with diabetes, the success means one more step toward a widespread cure. Up to two dozen Tristate residents each year are expected to undergo an islet cell transplant.

        But there aren't enough donated pancreases to produce sufficient islet cells. Only a few thousand people become organ donors each year, but more than a million people have Type I diabetes.

        Dr. Rilo and other researchers are racing to expand the islet cell supply, including searching for stem cells in a diabetic's own failed pancreas to grow islet cells in the lab, Dr. Rilo said.

        No one knows how long the islet cells last. Studies in Canada, where the latest transplant technique was developed, indicate that 80 percent of transplanted islet cells have lasted more than a year; about 80 percent have lasted two years.

        For now, Ms. Bowman still takes about half her usual insulin dose, but her second islet cell transplant will make even that unnecessary, her doctors predict.

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