Stress hyperglycemia

ABSTRACT

Stress hyperglycemia is commonly encountered condition in a wide variety of clinical settings. It represents body response to stress by various neurohumoral mechanisms. Elevation of stress hormones, epinephrine and cortisol occurs during stress, that is accompanied with elevation of corticotrophin, growth hormone and glucagon. These changes are responsible for hyperglycemia and hypercatabolism seen in stressful conditions. Depending upon the nature of stress, hyperglycemia varies from mild to severe with no upper limit and disappears once the stress is over. Although, not an entirely innocuous condition, yet, it is a marker of bad prognosis in certain clinical states which should be closely monitored. Stress hyperglycemia must be differentiated from diabetes mellitus for proper management of the patient