Early Clinical Detection of Pharmacologic Response in Insulin Action in a Nondiabetic Insulin-Resistant Population

A Model-Informed Drug Discovery and Development Strategy for the Novel Glucose-Responsive Insulin MK-2640 Enabled Rapid Decision Making

A model‐informed drug discovery and development strategy played a key role in the novel glucose‐responsive insulin MK‐2640’s early clinical development strategy and supported a novel clinical trial paradigm to assess glucose responsiveness. The development and application of in silico modeling approaches by leveraging substantial published clinical insulin pharmacokinetic–pharmacodynamic (PKPD) data and emerging preclinical and clinical data enabled rapid quantitative decision making. Learnings can be applied to define PKPD properties of novel insulins that could become therapeutically meaningful for diabetic patients.

Effects of Dapagliflozin on Body Composition and Liver Tests in Patients with Nonalcoholic Steatohepatitis Associated with Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus: A Prospective, Open-label, Uncontrolled Study

Background

Nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH) is an active form of nonalcoholic fatty liver disease. Risk factors for NASH include type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) and obesity. Sodium–glucose cotransporter 2 (SGLT2) inhibitors used to treat T2DM prevent glucose reabsorption in the kidney and increase glucose urinary excretion. Dapagliflozin is a potent, selective SGLT2 inhibitor that reduces hyperglycemia in patients with T2DM and has been demonstrated to reduce some complications associated with NASH in rodent models.

Objective

To assess the efficacy and safety profile of dapagliflozin for the treatment of NASH-associated with T2DM.

Methods

In this single-arm, nonrandomized, open-label study, 16 patients with percutaneous liver biopsy-confirmed NASH and T2DM were enrolled to be prescribed dapagliflozin 5 mg/d for 24 weeks. Of these, 11 patients were evaluable. Patients with chronic liver disease other than NASH were excluded. Body composition, laboratory variables related to liver tests and metabolism, and glucose homeostasis were assessed at baseline and periodically during the study. Changes from baseline were evaluated with the Wilcoxon signed-rank test.

Results

Administration of dapagliflozin for 24 weeks was associated with significant decreases in body mass index (P < 0.01), waist circumference (P < 0.01), and waist-to-hip ratio (P < 0.01). Changes in body composition were driven by reductions in body fat mass (P < 0.01) and percent body fat (P < 0.01), without changes in lean mass or total body water. Liver tests (ie, serum concentrations of aspartate aminotransferase, alanine aminotransferase, ferritin, and type IV collagen 7S) also significantly improved during the study. Insulin concentrations decreased (P < 0.01 by Week 24) in combination with significant reductions in fasting plasma glucose (P < 0.01) and glycated hemoglobin (P < 0.01) levels and increases in adiponectin (P < 0.01) levels from Week 4 onward.

Conclusions

Dapagliflozin was associated with improvements in body composition, most likely a reduction in visceral fat, which occurred together with improvements in liver tests and metabolic variables in patients with NASH-associated with T2DM.

UMIN Clinical Trial Registry identifier: UMIN000023574.

Phenotyping of adipose, liver, and skeletal muscle insulin resistance and response to pioglitazone in spontaneously obese rhesus monkeys

Insulin resistance and diabetes can develop spontaneously with obesity and aging in rhesus monkeys, highly similar to the natural history of obesity, insulin resistance, and progression to type 2 diabetes in humans. The current studies in obese rhesus were undertaken to assess hepatic and adipose contributions to systemic insulin resistance-currently, a gap in our knowledge-and to benchmark the responses to pioglitazone (PIO). A two-step hyperinsulinemic-euglycemic clamp, with tracer-based glucose flux estimates, was used to measure insulin resistance, and in an intervention study was repeated following 6 wk of PIO treatment (3 mg/kg). Compared with lean healthy rhesus, obese rhesus has a 60% reduction of glucose utilization during a high insulin infusion and markedly impaired suppression of lipolysis, which was evident at both low and high insulin infusion. However, obese dysmetabolic rhesus manifests only mild hepatic insulin resistance. Six-week PIO treatment significantly improved skeletal muscle and adipose insulin resistance (by ~50%). These studies strengthen the concept that insulin resistance in obese rhesus closely resembles human insulin resistance and indicate the value of obese rhesus for appraising new insulin-sensitizing therapeutics.

Adding to the spectrum of insulin sensitive populations for mixed meal tolerance test glucose reliability assessment

As a measure of insulin sensitivity, the mixed meal tolerance test (MMTT) is a simple technique that can provide robust results. The assay consists of examining plasma glucose, insulin and C-peptide prior to and following the consumption of a test meal. While this procedure has been used in clinical research for several years, there is no set standard protocol, and only until recently has the reliability of this assay been thoroughly evaluated in prediabetes and type 2 diabetes subjects. Interestingly, the results from this recent study demonstrated stronger MMTT reliability for the prediabetes and diabetes cohorts compared to obese controls. This finding suggests that the obese control group may have more inherent variability in glucose response during a meal challenge likely due to compensatory influences typically observed in non-diabetic insulin-resistant subjects. Furthermore, this study raises the question whether the MMTT assay is reliable in a non-obese cohort. Therefore, to promote the standardization of this technique and contribute to the band of insulin sensitive populations, we employed the same methodology and test meal as the reference study to evaluate the MMTT reliability in healthy and overweight men. Indeed, the interclass coefficient revealed high glucose response repeatability during the MMTT in insulin-sensitive men. Overall, the MMTT is a reliable test across a range of insulin sensitivity including healthy men. However, we propose further investigation may be required to fully define the utility of this methodology in obese non-diabetic insulin-resistant populations.