Insulin-induced thirst: are we overlooking it?

Excerpt

Time and again, we have been overwhelmed by little pearls of medicine which we gather along the way, in a journey to understand the functioning of human body in health and disease. In recent times, we came across two females with long-standing uncontrolled type 2 diabetes (HbA1c of more than 12%), who complained of an increased perception of thirst following sub-cutaneous insulin administration. They experienced thirst soon after initiating insulin that lasted for about 2–3 weeks. The response developed after about 30–60 min of each insulin shot. Capillary and plasma glucose values measured during thirst were between 120 and 150 mg/dl. Oblivious of the physiological effects of insulin on body water homeostasis, we had ignored the observation initially. The first lady even lost to follow-up as we disregarded her complaints repeatedly and attributed it to a psychiatric issue. …