Summary
Nine healthy subjects were studied on two separate occasions, at least two weeks apart, using the glucose clamp technique to produce a gradual hypoglycaemia. Glucose thresholds for neuroendocrine and symptom responses varied up to 1.5 mmol/l between subjects. There was a significant correlation between individual glucose thresholds on day 1 and 2 for adrenaline (p = 0.0008), growth hormone (p = 0.007) and pancreatic polypeptide (p = 0.02), and for autonomic (p = 0.018) and neuroglycopoenic (p = 0.023) symptoms, whereas no significant correlations were found for glucagon and cortisol. The mean intra-individual differences in glucose thresholds between day 1 and 2 were 0.22 mmol/l for the hormones and 0.25 mmol/l for the symptoms. We conclude that healthy subjects differ in hypoglycaemic thresholds, and that the difference reflects individual variation.
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Vea, H., Jorde, R., Sager, G. et al. Reproducibility of glycaemic thresholds for activation of counterregulatory hormones and hypoglycaemic symptoms in healthy subjects. Diabetologia 35, 958–961 (1992). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00401425
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00401425