A patient with acromegaly who showed remarkable improvement of hyperglycemia after treatment with octreotide

A case with diabetes mellitus associated with growth hormone (GH)-producing pituitary adenoma is described. A 56-year-old woman who had been treated for diabetes mellitus for 3 years, was admitted for the treatment of hyperglycemia. She showed a few acromegalic features and her plasma GH level was 146 +/- 16 ng/ml. After improvement of plasma glucose level by insulin injection, octreotide therapy (100 mu g/8 hours) was started. Seven days after the initiation of octreotide therapy, the fasting plasma glucose level was almost normalized without insulin injection, After the octreotide treatment, urinary C-peptide excretion was significantly decreased and the plasma GH level became within normal range. In this case, octreotide appears to have improved the insulin sensitivity by reducing the plasma GH level.