Is biochemical hypoglycemia necessary during an insulin tolerance test?

ABSTRACT Objective The insulin tolerance test (ITT) has been accepted as the gold standard test for assessing the integrity of the growth hormone (GH) – insulin-like growth factor (IGF-1) axis and the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis. The goal of the test is to achieve clinical and biochemical hypoglycemia at a blood glucose level ≤ 40 mg/dL to effectively and correctly assess the HPA and GH-IGF-1 axes. In this study, the GH and cortisol responses of patients who achieved and failed to achieve biochemical hypoglycemia during an ITT were compared. Subjects and methods One hundr...