INVESTIGATION OF THE NUMBER AND AFFINITY OF INSULIN RECEPTORS IN RED BLOOD CELLS OF TYPE 2 DIABETICS

Abstract

Background: The determination of insulin receptors on RBC membrane is a suitable tool for the study of these receptors in diabetes and its related complications. The common methods for the study is the biopsy of fat or muscular tissues, cell culture or a preparation of certain amount of monocytes which is associated with some difficulties. Present study utilizes RBC's for this purpose.

Methods: Certain amount of RBCs were exposed to a known amount of labeled Insulin and varying concentration of unlabelled Insulin. The competitive effect of Insulin replacement was determined by the measurement of residual receptor radioactivity. This study was carried out in three groups of healthy, poor controlled and good controlled diabetics.

Results: There were significant differences between the normal and poor controlled diabetics (P=0.017). In addition differences in receptor binding was obtained between good controlled diabetics and normal which were not significant (P=0.09). All changes were inversely proportional to the HbA1C of specimen. Using Scat chard plots the number of receptors in each group, normal, poor controlled and good controlled were determined to be 1820 (± 72.8), 1026 (±40.4) and 1230 (±  49.2) respectively.

Conclusion: Considering the above results, it could be seen that the evaluation of the number of receptors in RBC  could be a suitable tool for studying the state of insulin receptor in both physiological and pathological conditions.