Biomolecules (Aug 2021)

Glucagon as a Therapeutic Approach to Severe Hypoglycemia: After 100 Years, Is It Still the Antidote of Insulin?

  • Francesca Porcellati,
  • Stefania Di Mauro,
  • Alessio Mazzieri,
  • Alessandra Scamporrino,
  • Agnese Filippello,
  • Michelantonio De Fano,
  • Carmine Giuseppe Fanelli,
  • Francesco Purrello,
  • Roberta Malaguarnera,
  • Salvatore Piro

DOI
https://doi.org/10.3390/biom11091281
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 11, no. 9
p. 1281

Abstract

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Hypoglycemia represents a dark and tormented side of diabetes mellitus therapy. Patients treated with insulin or drug inducing hypoglycemia, consider hypoglycemia as a harmful element, which leads to their resistance and lack of acceptance of the pathology and relative therapies. Severe hypoglycemia, in itself, is a risk for patients and relatives. The possibility to have novel strategies and scientific knowledge concerning hypoglycemia could represent an enormous benefit. Novel available glucagon formulations, even now, allow clinicians to deal with hypoglycemia differently with respect to past years. Novel scientific evidence leads to advances concerning physiopathological mechanisms that regulated glycemic homeostasis. In this review, we will try to show some of the important aspects of this field.

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