EARLY INSULIN RESPONSE TO INTRAVENOUS GLUCOSE IN STEROID-STRESS DIABETES

Ten healthy people were found to have an abnormal response to corticosteroid-glucose tolerance test during an industrial survey designed to detect subclinical diabetes and were compared to 10 normal controls selected from the same survey. Although insulin-to-glucose ratios, after intravenous injection of glucose, were similar in both groups, blood glucose values subsequent to the fasting level were significantly higher in the stress-diabetic group, indicating a suboptimal insulin response. Such subjects appear to represent the earliest stage in progressive decompensation of glucose tolerance due to relative insulin insufficiency in the presence of a mild peripheral block to glucose utilization. © 1969.