Diabetes, Vol 37, Issue 9 1271-1278, Copyright © 1988 by American Diabetes Association
Interrelationships among insulin's antilipolytic and glucoregulatory effects and plasma triglycerides in nondiabetic and diabetic patients with endogenous hypertriglyceridemia
H Yki-Jarvinen and MR Taskinen
Second Department of Medicine, University of Helsinki, Finland.
We tested the hypothesis that the previously observed association among
hypertriglyceridemia, hyperinsulinemia, and insulin resistance could be
explained by a defect in insulin's antilipolytic effect. Insulin action was
measured in 10 nondiabetic and 8 diabetic patients with
hypertriglyceridemia (fasting plasma triglyceride 800 +/- 154 and 1105 +/-
445 mg/dl, respectively, P NS; fasting plasma glucose 99 +/- 3 and 161 +/-
12 mg/dl, respectively, P less than .001) and in 8 weight-matched
normolipemic nondiabetic individuals (fasting plasma triglyceride and
glucose 110 +/- 21 and 91 +/- 3 mg/dl). The slope of the decay in plasma
free fatty acid (FFA) during insulin infusion was used as an index of
insulin's antilipolytic effect. Insulin stimulation of glucose uptake in
vivo during intravenous hyperinsulinemic clamp and in vitro in adipocytes
were measures of insulin's glucoregulatory action. Both glucoregulatory and
antilipolytic effects were similarly reduced in both hypertriglyceridemic
groups compared with normal subjects. The plasma triglyceride concentration
correlated positively with the slope of FFA suppression by insulin (r =
.81, P less than .0001) and the fasting FFA concentration (r = .65, P less
than .0001). In multiple linear regression analysis, insulin's
antilipolytic effect and the fasting FFA concentration explained 83% of the
variation in the plasma triglyceride concentration. These associations were
independent of insulin's glucoregulatory effect and the fasting plasma
insulin concentration. The data indicate that patients with endogenous
hypertriglyceridemia are resistant to both the antilipolytic and
glucoregulatory actions of insulin and that increased flux of FFA as a
result of the latter, rather than hyperinsulinemia, is responsible for
elevation of very-low-density lipoprotein production.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT
250 WORDS)