medwireNews: Early-phase hyperglucagonemia in response to ingesting a meal is associated with postprandial glucose excursions in patients with type 1 diabetes, research suggests.
Ayako Ito (Nagasaki University Hospital, Japan) and co-researchers found that “inappropriate” glucagon secretions occurred in response to a liquid mixed meal tolerance test (MMTT) with adequate use of bolus insulin in 34 Japanese patients with type 1 diabetes and 23 controls with type 2 diabetes, with glucagon levels peaking after 30 minutes. At the peak, average glucagon levels were significantly lower in patients with type 1 versus type 2 diabetes, at 48 versus 65 ng/L.
Ito told delegates at the virtual 56th EASD Annual Meeting that the inappropriate glucagon secretions significantly correlated with glucose excursions after meal ingestion, with a correlation coefficient of 0.54.
This positive correlation remained significant when patients were categorized according to diabetes duration (<5 vs ≥5 years) and fasting C-peptide levels (<0.10 vs ≥0.10 nmol/L), indicating that the association occurs “regardless of endogenous insulin secretion or diabetes duration,” said Ito.
“This result suggested that exaggerated postprandial glucagon release might be proposed as a driving factor [behind] postprandial hyperglycemia in [type 1 diabetes] as well as in [type 2 diabetes],” she concluded.
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