The last WA participant to be born

The last Perth-based participant was born recently at the Perth Children’s Hospital (PCH). Baby Angus arrived late June 2020 and is the first child of Beth and Sam Armstrong. Sam was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes when he was 17.

Sam works as a physiotherapist at Perth Children’s Hospital, so he had heard of the ENDIA Study from his time working with the diabetes research and clinical teams at Telethon Kids Institute and PCH previously.

“I always knew Ali and Alex (ENDIA nurses) were kept busy with ENDIA, and that it was a massive project, but I never thought about if and when I would be involved,” he said.

“Beth and I both work in health, so we are happy to assist, even in a very small way, to something that might help understand the causes of type 1 diabetes. There is still much to know, so hopefully this national study can increase the knowledge base.

“It wasn’t much of a thought at the time when we enrolled in the study, but now Angus is here, the ongoing benefit for us in being in ENDIA is that he has surveillance to monitor any antibody development.”

The ENDIA Study hopes to continue following all the children at least until they are three years old.