Early Marker of Insulin Resistance Found in Mexican Americans

A metabolic "glitch" could help explain why Mexican Americans are two to three times more likely to suffer from diabetes than their European American counterparts.

Researchers at Baylor College of Medicine have found that one of the body's basic metabolic responses to the hormone insulin, which is to turn off the production of glucose by the liver when a meal is consumed, is significantly reduced in Mexican Americans.

"We believe this could be one of the earliest markers of insulin resistance in Mexican Americans," said Dr. Ashok Balasubramanyam, Baylor assistant professor of medicine.

Insulin resistance, a condition in which body tissues become insensitive to the action of insulin, is responsible for 90 to 95 percent of all cases of diabetes in Mexican Americans.

Because this defect was found in completely healthy Mexican Americans who had no close relatives with diabetes, the researchers believe it is one of the factors that could be contributing to the high rates of Type 2 diabetes in this group as a whole.

"Knowing that this pathway is affected could help us identify the cause, such as a unique gene responsible for this disregulation, and lead to therapies and early lifestyle interventions that help at-risk Mexican Americans before the clinical symptoms of insulin resistance and diabetes appear," Dr. Balasubramanyam said.

Courtesy of Baylor College of Medicine

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©2006 Texas Medical Center

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