Plasma endothelin-1 levels in patients with type II diabetes mellitus with vascular complications

ABSTRACT

The aim of this study was to evaluate plasma endothelin-1 [ET-1] levels in patients with non insulin dependent diabetes mellitus [NIDDM] and its relation to the presence of diabetic vascular complications. The study was conducted on 40 patients with NIDDM with fatty liver and divided into 2 groups. Group 2 [G2] consisted of 20 patients with NIDDM associated with hypertension. Group 3 [G3] consisted of 20 patients with NIDDM with various diabetic vascular complications. Twenty of apparently healthy subjects, age and sex matched, served as a control group [G1]. The results showed that the plasma ET-1 concentration was significantly highly increased in the two patients' groups compared with the control group and was significantly highly increased in group 2 compared with group 3. Plasma ET-1 was positively correlated with the duration of diabetes mellitus, fasting blood glucose, postprandial blood glucose, triglyceride, total cholesterol, low density lipoprotein and serum urea and negatively correlated with high density lipoprotein. It was concluded that ET-1 might represent a new marker of diabetes related vascular damage