The effect of ghrelin on insulin sensitivity and beta-cell function after sleeve gastrectomy

What Was Tested

This randomized controlled trial paper looks at Ghrelin.

This was a human, placebo-controlled, randomized, crossover study.

The researchers investigated the effect of elevating ghrelin by an intravenous ghrelin infusion on β-cell function and insulin sensitivity using the "Botnia-clamp" (intravenous glucose tolerance test combined with hyperinsulinemic-euglycemic clamp), compared with saline coinfusion.

Who Took Part

PubMed indexes the participants as adults and middle-aged adults, both men and women.

How the Study Was Run

The design is described as randomized, placebo-controlled and crossover.

Random assignment meant chance, not the researchers, decided who got Ghrelin and who got the comparison, which limits bias.

A placebo (an inactive look-alike) gave the Ghrelin group a baseline to be compared against.

Each person switched between Ghrelin and the comparison at some point, usually with a gap in between.

Twelve SG-operated [aged 51 ± 10.9 yr, BMI 32.1 ± 4.6 kg/m2 (means ± SD)], and 10 sex-, age-, and body mass index (BMI)-matched unoperated controls without diabetes were included.

What Was Measured

The researchers investigated the effect of elevating ghrelin by an intravenous ghrelin infusion on β-cell function and insulin sensitivity using the "Botnia-clamp" (intravenous glucose tolerance test combined with hyperinsulinemic-euglycemic clamp), compared with saline coinfusion.

Outcomes were peripheral insulin sensitivity (M/I) and β-cell function, assessed as the disposition index (DI), calculated as first phase insulin secretion × M/I.

Topics PubMed links to this paper include Insulin Resistance, Insulin-Secreting Cells, Ghrelin, Gastrectomy, Glucose Clamp Technique, Insulin and Glucose Tolerance Test.

Author keywords: Botnia clamp, bariatric surgery, glucose metabolism and hepatic glucose production.

What This Means in Plain Language

The paper is a randomized, placebo-controlled and crossover study of Ghrelin.

The publication is from 2026 (American journal of physiology. Endocrinology and metabolism), a journal based in United States.

More context: the Ghrelin compound page, all human trials.