Plasma proinsulin-like components and insulin in chronic liver disease.

In order to explain the increase of total IRI frequently observed at basal status, and after glucose administration, in patients with chronic liver disease, plasma proinsulin-like component and insulin levels have been studied in fourteen patients with liver cirrhosis associated or not with clinical or subclinical diabetes mellitus. A significative increase of plasma insulin was observed at basal status and after a glucose load not only in subjects with clinical or subclinical diabetes but also in those patients without carbohydrate abnormalities. This increase is apparently not correlated to any clinical characteristic and is associated in fasting and after glucose load with increased proinsulin-like component levels especially in patients with clinical or subclinical diabetes.