Insulin and heart failure.

Insulin and glucose have long been known to be effective in experimental heart failure but there is still surprisingly little knowledge of their effects on cardiac function in man. Reawakening of interest in this relation has been occasioned by two recent findings. Firstly, the critical role of glucose in the metabolism of the failing anoxic heart has been precisely defined (Scheuer, I967; Weissler et al., I968; Owen, Thomas, and Opie, I969). Secondly, the finding that insulin release was suppressed in patients in heart failure (Taylor et al., I969; Allison, Chamberlain, and Hinton, I969; Sharma et al., I970; Majid et al., I97i). A review of the current status of knowledge of this potentially important aspect of cardiac metabolism was, therefore, considered to be of interest to cardiological physicians and physiologists alike.