The Prevention and Correction of Hypoglycemia

Metabolic Messengers: glucagon

Plasma glucose is tightly regulated via the secretion of the two glucose-regulating hormones insulin and glucagon. Situated next to the insulin-secreting β-cells, the α-cells produce and secrete glucagon-one of the body's few blood glucose-increasing hormones. Diabetes is a bihormonal disorder, resulting from both inadequate insulin secretion and dysregulation of glucagon. The year 2023 marks the 100th anniversary of the discovery of glucagon, making it particularly timely to highlight the roles of this systemic metabolic messenger in health and disease.

American Association of Clinical Endocrinology Clinical Practice Guideline: Developing a Diabetes Mellitus Comprehensive Care Plan-2022 Update

OBJECTIVE

The objective of this clinical practice guideline is to provide updated and new evidence-based recommendations for the comprehensive care of persons with diabetes mellitus to clinicians, diabetes-care teams, other health care professionals and stakeholders, and individuals with diabetes and their caregivers.

METHODS

The American Association of Clinical Endocrinology selected a task force of medical experts and staff who updated and assessed clinical questions and recommendations from the prior 2015 version of this guideline and conducted literature searches for relevant scientific papers published from January 1, 2015, through May 15, 2022. Selected studies from results of literature searches composed the evidence base to update 2015 recommendations as well as to develop new recommendations based on review of clinical evidence, current practice, expertise, and consensus, according to established American Association of Clinical Endocrinology protocol for guideline development.

RESULTS

This guideline includes 170 updated and new evidence-based clinical practice recommendations for the comprehensive care of persons with diabetes. Recommendations are divided into four sections: (1) screening, diagnosis, glycemic targets, and glycemic monitoring; (2) comorbidities and complications, including obesity and management with lifestyle, nutrition, and bariatric surgery, hypertension, dyslipidemia, retinopathy, neuropathy, diabetic kidney disease, and cardiovascular disease; (3) management of prediabetes, type 2 diabetes with antihyperglycemic pharmacotherapy and glycemic targets, type 1 diabetes with insulin therapy, hypoglycemia, hospitalized persons, and women with diabetes in pregnancy; (4) education and new topics regarding diabetes and infertility, nutritional supplements, secondary diabetes, social determinants of health, and virtual care, as well as updated recommendations on cancer risk, nonpharmacologic components of pediatric care plans, depression, education and team approach, occupational risk, role of sleep medicine, and vaccinations in persons with diabetes.

CONCLUSIONS

This updated clinical practice guideline provides evidence-based recommendations to assist with person-centered, team-based clinical decision-making to improve the care of persons with diabetes mellitus.

Differential Expression of Inflammatory Markers in Hypoglycemia Unawareness Associated with Type 1 Diabetes: A Case Report

The recurrence of hypoglycemic episodes leads to attenuation of the normal counter-regulatory mechanisms that are controlled by the hypothalamus, which results in hypoglycemia unawareness (HU). In this case report, we described for the first time the differential expression of TNF-α, IL-1β, IL-6, and IFN-γ in a blood sample that was taken from a 27-year-old patient with type 1 diabetes mellitus (T1DM) who was diagnosed with HU. The anti-diabetic regimen is currently based on insulin injection, but the patient is planning to start the use of an insulin pump to have better control of glucose levels. Our results showed a trend toward an increase in the expression of IL-1β, IL-6, and IFN-γ in T1DM patient with HU. However, the mRNA level of TNF-α showed a significant decrease. These observations suggest that systemic inflammation could be an underlying cause of HU.

Insulin-induced hypoglycemia increases hepatic sensitivity to glucagon in dogs

In individuals with type 1 diabetes, hypoglycemia is a common consequence of overinsulinization. Under conditions of insulin-induced hypoglycemia, glucagon is the most important stimulus for hepatic glucose production. In contrast, during euglycemia, insulin potently inhibits glucagon's effect on the liver. The first aim of the present study was to determine whether low blood sugar augments glucagon's ability to increase glucose production. Using a conscious catheterized dog model, we found that hypoglycemia increased glucagon's ability to overcome the inhibitory effect of insulin on hepatic glucose production by almost 3-fold, an effect exclusively attributable to marked enhancement of the effect of glucagon on net glycogen breakdown. To investigate the molecular mechanism by which this effect comes about, we analyzed hepatic biopsies from the same animals, and found that hypoglycemia resulted in a decrease in insulin signaling. Furthermore, hypoglycemia and glucagon had an additive effect on the activation of AMPK, which was associated with altered activity of the enzymes of glycogen metabolism.

Glucagon as a treatment of severe hypoglycemia: safe and efficacious but underutilized

Over the past 2 decades, a number of different studies have demonstrated that tight metabolic control not only reduces the incidence but also delays the development of complications in people with type 1 and type 2 diabetes. Unfortunately, the intensive insulin therapy required to achieve tight glucose control is also associated with a significantly increased risk of developing hypoglycemia. Hypoglycemia can cause physical as well as psychosocial morbidity, has been associated with adverse neurological manifestations, and can sometimes result in death. It can affect daily activities such as driving, working, and studying and can result in inconvenience and embarrassment as well as cause fear for both the person with diabetes and significant others. This fear is often the biggest barrier for optimal glycemic control. With self-management education and regular monitoring of blood glucose, people with diabetes can learn to recognize their unique signs and symptoms of hypoglycemia, and with improved understanding of how insulin, food, and activity affect blood glucose levels, the patient can learn to prevent hypoglycemia. However, because managing blood glucose can be such a delicate balancing act, it is important to be prepared. An important weapon in the treatment of severe hypoglycemia is the use of glucagon, a treatment that is generally underappreciated, underevaluated, undertaught, and most certainly underutilized. The purpose of this article is to review the role of glucagon in the treatment of severe hypoglycemia and discuss how better information about and understanding of the use of glucagon might be helpful toward alleviating some of the fears surrounding hypoglycemia.

Mechanisms of hypoglycemia-associated autonomic failure and its component syndromes in diabetes

Iatrogenic hypoglycemia is a problem for people with diabetes. It causes recurrent morbidity, and sometimes death, as well as a vicious cycle of recurrent hypoglycemia, precluding maintenance of euglycemia over a lifetime of diabetes. Improved therapeutic approaches that will minimize both hypo- and hyperglycemia will be based on insight into the pathophysiology of glucoregulation, specifically glucose counterregulation, in insulin-deficient (type 1 and advanced type 2) diabetes. In such patients, hypoglycemia is the result of the interplay of relative or absolute therapeutic insulin excess and compromised physiological (the syndrome of defective glucose counterregulation) and behavioral (the syndrome of hypoglycemia unawareness) defenses against falling plasma glucose concentrations. The concept of hypoglycemia-associated autonomic failure (HAAF) in diabetes posits that recent antecedent iatrogenic hypoglycemia causes both defective glucose counterregulation (by reducing epinephrine responses to a given level of subsequent hypoglycemia in the setting of absent decrements in insulin and absent increments in glucagon) and hypoglycemia unawareness (by reducing sympathoadrenal and the resulting neurogenic symptom responses to a given level of subsequent hypoglycemia) and thus a vicious cycle of recurrent hypoglycemia. The clinical impact of HAAF is well established in type 1 diabetes; it also affects those with advanced type 2 diabetes. It is now known to be largely reversible, by as little as 2-3 weeks of scrupulous avoidance of hypoglycemia, in most affected patients. However, the mechanisms of HAAF and its component syndromes are largely unknown. Loss of the glucagon secretory response, a key feature of defective glucose counterregulation, is plausibly explained by insulin deficiency, specifically loss of the decrement in intraislet insulin that normally signals glucagon secretion as glucose levels fall. Reduced neurogenic symptoms, a key feature of hypoglycemia unawareness, are largely the result of reduced sympathetic neural responses to falling glucose levels. The mechanism by which hypoglycemia shifts the glycemic thresholds for sympathoadrenal activation to lower plasma glucose concentrations, the key feature of both components of HAAF, is not known. It does not appear to be the result of the release of a systemic mediator (e.g., cortisol, epinephrine) during antecedent hypoglycemia or of increased blood-to-brain glucose transport (although increased transport of alternative fuels is conceivable). It is likely the result of alterations of brain metabolism. Although there is an array of clues, the specific alteration remains to be identified. While the research focus has been largely on the hypothalamus, hypoglycemia is now known to activate widespread brain regions, including the medial prefrontal cortex. The possibility that HAAF could be the result of posthypoglycemic brain glycogen supercompensation has also been raised. Finally, there appear to be diverse causes of HAAF. In addition to recent antecedent hypoglycemia, these include exercise- and sleep-related HAAF. Clearly, a unifying mechanism of HAAF would need to incorporate these causes as well. Pending the prevention and cure of diabetes, critical fundamental, translational, and outcomes research is needed if we are to eliminate hypoglycemia from the lives of people affected by diabetes.

Loss of the decrement in intraislet insulin plausibly explains loss of the glucagon response to hypoglycemia in insulin-deficient diabetes: documentation of the intraislet insulin hypothesis in humans

The intraislet insulin hypothesis for the signaling of the glucagon secretory response to hypoglycemia states that a decrease in arterial glucose --> a decrease in beta-cell insulin secretion --> a decrease in tonic alpha-cell inhibition by insulin --> an increase in alpha-cell glucagon secretion. To test this hypothesis in humans, a hyperinsulinemic- euglycemic ( approximately 5.0 mmol/l [90 mg/dl] x 2 h) and then a hypoglycemic ( approximately 3.0 mmol/l [55 mg/dl] x 2 h) clamp was performed in 14 healthy young adults on two occasions, once with oral administration of the ATP-sensitive potassium channel agonist diazoxide to selectively suppress baseline insulin secretion and once with the administration of a placebo. The decrement in plasma C-peptide during the induction of hypoglycemia was reduced by approximately 50% in the diazoxide clamps (from 0.3 +/- 0.0 to 0.1 +/- 0.0 nmol/l [0.8 +/- 0.1 to 0.4 +/- 0.1 ng/ml]) compared with the placebo clamps (from 0.4 +/- 0.0 to 0.1 +/- 0.0 nmol/l [1.2 +/- 0.1 to 0.4 +/- 0.1 ng/ml]) (P = 0.0015). This reduction of the decrement in intraislet insulin during induction of hypoglycemia caused an approximately 50% reduction (P = 0.0010) of the increase in plasma glucagon in the diazoxide clamps (from 29 +/- 3 to 35 +/- 2 pmol/l [102 +/- 9 to 123 +/- 8 pg/ml]) compared with the placebo clamps (from 28 +/- 2 to 43 +/- 5 pmol/l [98 +/- 7 to 151 +/- 16 pg/ml]). Baseline glucagon levels, the glucagon response to intravenous arginine, and the autonomic (adrenomedullary, sympathetic neural, and parasympathetic neural) responses to hypoglycemia were not altered by diazoxide. These data indicate that a decrease in intraislet insulin is a signal for the glucagon secretory response to hypoglycemia in healthy humans. The absence of that signal plausibly explains the loss of the glucagon response to falling plasma glucose concentrations, a key feature of the pathogenesis of iatrogenic hypoglycemia, in insulin-deficient (type 1 and advanced type 2) diabetes.

Cortisol elevations comparable to those that occur during hypoglycemia do not cause hypoglycemia-associated autonomic failure

The concept of hypoglycemia-associated autonomic failure (HAAF) in diabetes posits that recent antecedent iatrogenic hypoglycemia causes both defective glucose counterregulation (by reducing the epinephrine response in the setting of an absent glucagon response) and hypoglycemia unawareness (by reducing the autonomic-sympathetic neural and adrenomedullary response and the resulting neurogenic [autonomic] symptom responses) and thus causes a vicious cycle of recurrent hypoglycemia. To assess the suggestion that it is the cortisol response to antecedent hypoglycemia that mediates HAAF, we tested the hypothesis that plasma cortisol elevations during euglycemia that are comparable to those that occur during hypoglycemia reduce sympathoadrenal and neurogenic symptom responses to subsequent hypoglycemia. To do this, 12 healthy subjects were studied with hyperinsulinemic-stepped hypoglycemic clamps the day after saline or cortisol (1.3 +/- 0.2 micro g. kg(-1) x min(-1)) infusions from 0930 to 1200 and from 1330 to 1600. Compared with saline, antecedent cortisol elevations did not reduce the sympathoadrenal (e.g., final plasma epinephrine levels of 674 +/- 84 vs. 606 +/- 80 pg/ml and final plasma norepinephrine levels of 332 +/- 26 vs. 304 +/- 26 pg/ml) or neurogenic symptom (e.g., final scores of 9.3 +/- 1.1 vs. 13.2 +/- 1.3) responses to subsequent hypoglycemia. Thus, these data do not support the suggestion that cortisol mediates HAAF.

Hypoglycemia in diabetes

Iatrogenic hypoglycemia causes recurrent morbidity in most people with type 1 diabetes and many with type 2 diabetes, and it is sometimes fatal. The barrier of hypoglycemia generally precludes maintenance of euglycemia over a lifetime of diabetes and thus precludes full realization of euglycemia's long-term benefits. While the clinical presentation is often characteristic, particularly for the experienced individual with diabetes, the neurogenic and neuroglycopenic symptoms of hypoglycemia are nonspecific and relatively insensitive; therefore, many episodes are not recognized. Hypoglycemia can result from exogenous or endogenous insulin excess alone. However, iatrogenic hypoglycemia is typically the result of the interplay of absolute or relative insulin excess and compromised glucose counterregulation in type 1 and advanced type 2 diabetes. Decrements in insulin, increments in glucagon, and, absent the latter, increments in epinephrine stand high in the hierarchy of redundant glucose counterregulatory factors that normally prevent or rapidly correct hypoglycemia. In insulin-deficient diabetes (exogenous) insulin levels do not decrease as glucose levels fall, and the combination of deficient glucagon and epinephrine responses causes defective glucose counterregulation. Reduced sympathoadrenal responses cause hypoglycemia unawareness. The concept of hypoglycemia-associated autonomic failure in diabetes posits that recent antecedent hypoglycemia causes both defective glucose counterregulation and hypoglycemia unawareness. By shifting glycemic thresholds for the sympathoadrenal (including epinephrine) and the resulting neurogenic responses to lower plasma glucose concentrations, antecedent hypoglycemia leads to a vicious cycle of recurrent hypoglycemia and further impairment of glucose counterregulation. Thus, short-term avoidance of hypoglycemia reverses hypoglycemia unawareness in most affected patients. The clinical approach to minimizing hypoglycemia while improving glycemic control includes 1) addressing the issue, 2) applying the principles of aggressive glycemic therapy, including flexible and individualized drug regimens, and 3) considering the risk factors for iatrogenic hypoglycemia. The latter include factors that result in absolute or relative insulin excess: drug dose, timing, and type; patterns of food ingestion and exercise; interactions with alcohol and other drugs; and altered sensitivity to or clearance of insulin. They also include factors that are clinical surrogates of compromised glucose counterregulation: endogenous insulin deficiency; history of severe hypoglycemia, hypoglycemia unawareness, or both; and aggressive glycemic therapy per se, as evidenced by lower HbA(1c) levels, lower glycemic goals, or both. In a patient with hypoglycemia unawareness (which implies recurrent hypoglycemia) a 2- to 3-week period of scrupulous avoidance of hypoglycemia is advisable. Pending the prevention and cure of diabetes or the development of methods that provide glucose-regulated insulin replacement or secretion, we need to learn to replace insulin in a much more physiological fashion, to prevent, correct, or compensate for compromised glucose counterregulation, or both if we are to achieve near-euglycemia safely in most people with diabetes.