TYPE 2 DIABETES: According to the American Diabetes Association, nearly 21 million Americans are living with diabetes. Between 90 percent and 95 percent of diabetics have type 2 diabetes. In type 2 diabetes, either the body does not produce enough insulin or the cells are unable to use the insulin it does produce properly. Insulin is necessary for the body to use sugar. Sugar is the basic fuel for the cells in the body, and insulin transports the sugar from the blood into the cells.

Risk factors for type 2 diabetes include obesity, older age, family history, gestational diabetes, physical inactivity, and race/ethnicity. African Americans, Hispanic/Latino Americans, American Indians, and some Asian Americans and Native Hawaiians or other Pacific Islanders are at particularly high risk for type 2 diabetes. Type 2 diabetes is also increasingly being diagnosed in children and adolescents.

TREATING DIABETES: There are several drugs approved to treat type 2 diabetes. These include oral medications called insulin sensitizers that make the body better able to use the insulin it produces. Steven Shoelson, M.D., Ph.D., from the Joslin Diabetes Center in Boston, says: "None of the currently available medications are perfect, and one of the biggest problems we have with the current medications is they don't really treat the basic problem. We are trying to develop new treatments that are based more on the cause than simply treating the consequence."

GOING AFTER THE SOURCE: In previous studies, Dr. Shoelson and his team found inflammation -- an immune system response that normally fights infection and promotes healing -- plays a huge part in the development of insulin resistance and type 2 diabetes. Dr. Shoelson and his team were the first to demonstrate a major trigger of inflammation is activated by weight gain. That trigger is a protein in the liver called NF-kB. The next step? Finding a way to reduce inflammation by turning off the trigger.

THE FIX: Doctors are studying a non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug commonly used to treat arthritis to quiet the inflammation in people with diabetes. The drug, called salsalate, has been around for years. In fact, it's in a class of drugs called salicylates that have been around for two centuries. (The most well-known drug in this class of drugs is aspirin.) In an early study using salsalate for type 2 diabetes, researchers found the drug significantly lowered blood sugar levels. Dr. Shoelson says, "We have also seen lowering of inflammatory markers that we think indicate the basic pathology of the disease." It's a safe medication and is very inexpensive -- making it a promising treatment. The drug also lowers lipid levels -- and will soon be tested to see how well it reduces heart disease. Now, researchers are recruiting patients at 16 sites across the country for a larger study that will determine the impact this drug could have for millions of people with type 2 diabetes.