Growth Hormone Levels in Chemical Diabetes

Chemical diabetes is an incompletely defined form of glucose intolerance which is more common in the later decades of life. Long‐term observations indicate that in half of the patients with persistent chemical diabetes, overt diabetes mellitus develops in the course of one decade of aging. Other studies have established that chemical diabetes is characterized by hyperinsulinemia which may be preceded by an initial lag in the insulin responses to oral administration of glucose. As a group, persons with chemical diabetes manifest higher serum triglyceride levels, a greater frequency of electrocardiographic abnormalities, and increased proteinuria. The data presented describe growth hormone patterns in chemical diabetes. The findings indicate that the lower serum growth hormone levels of obese adults of all age decades are also evident during glucose tolerance tests indicative of mild or moderate chemical diabetes. However, more severe degrees of glucose intolerance and chemical diabetes in obese persons are characterized by further decreases in growth hormone indices beyond those characteristic of obesity alone.