High levels of sugar in your bloodstream can damage blood vessels. By moving sugar out of the bloodstream and into muscle cells, insulin prevents this. However, if you have insulin resistance–if your muscles don’t respond to insulin–you have to make more than normal amounts of insulin to do the job. The job gets done but you end up with larger than normal amounts of insulin in your blood.
You might think it would be easy to tell if you’re making too much insulin; just measure it in the blood, right? The problem is that insulin disappears from the bloodstream so fast it’s impossible to tell how much you’re producing with a blood test. Scientists measure insulin production with a procedure called a glucose clamp test, but this examination is only done in research laboratories.
Doctors diagnose hyperinsulinemia by looking for signs of its effects on the body. The earliest and most reliable sign is excess fat buildup in the abdomen. Although scientists use computerized scans to measure fat in the abdomen, they’ve learned they can estimate the amount of visceral fat with reasonable accuracy simply by measuring the circumference of people’s abdomens with a tape measure and comparing it to their height. (Pants size doesn’t count. You need to wrap a tape measure around your belly at the level of your navel.) If your abdominal girth is more than 50 percent of your height, you probably have insulin resistance.
The “Metabolic Syndrome”
If in addition to increased belly fat, you have any of the following conditions, you are probably producing between two and six times the normal amount of insulin. Doctors call this the “Metabolic Syndrome.” It increases your risk of diabetes, heart disease and polycystic ovary syndrome.
–High blood levels of triglyceride (Higher than 150)
–Low blood levels of HDL—so called “good cholesterol” (40 or lower for males, 50 or lower for females)
–Borderline high blood pressure (130/85 or higher)
-Borderline fasting high blood sugar (110 or higher)
(These tests are often done as part of routine physical examinations so you might be able to get the results with a call to your doctor’s office.)
Type 2 Diabetes
Years of insulin overproduction often wears out the insulin producing cells (beta cells) of the pancreas. When insulin production can’t keep up with demand, your blood sugar rises which is called type 2 diabetes. If you have been diagnosed with type 2 diabetes, you’ve probably been overproducing insulin for years.
Polycystic Ovary Syndrome (PCOS)
Another condition brought on by hyperinsulinemia in women is polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS), America’s number one cause of infertility. If you have been diagnosed with PCOS you have probably had insulin resistance for years. Most women who have PCOS don’t know it. This is unfortunate because PCOS is preventable and treatable by taking measures to counteract insulin resistance.
The Double Whammy: High Glycemic Load Plus Insulin Resistance
