Changes in responsiveness to insulin induced by desoxycorticosterone, in diabetes mellitus.

Abstract

PREVIOUS study of a group of patients with diabetes mellitus, in whom liver biopsies were performed, revealed a high degree of correlation between fatty metamorphosis in the liver and insulin-insensitivity (1). Analysis of the available data suggested that the two phenomena were related to an independent common etiologic factor, rather than that the liver derangement was directly responsible for the insulin-insensitivity (1). The development of fatty infiltration of the liver and insulin-insensitivity, which has been demonstrated following the administration of anterior pituitary extract to animals (2), raised the possibility that at least one of factors responsible for the insulin-insensitivity in these ′human diabetics might be of pituitary origin (1). The demonstration by Cheng and Sayers (3) that desoxycorticosterone acetate increased the sensitivity to insulin in rats, presumably through the inhibition of the output of pituitary adrenocorticotropic hormone, led to the investigation of the effect of this steroid on insulin-sensitivity in human diabetes (4). The present study includes an extension of the previous observations in insulin-insensitive diabetes as well as an investigation of the effect of desoxycorticosterone on the responsiveness to insulin in the insulin-sensitive diabetic patient.