Effect of intermittent high intensity exercise on counter-regulatory hormones in type 1 diabetes glargine/glulisine users

Background: Brief intense sprint intervals during moderate intensity exercise prevent hypoglycemia in type 1 diabetic participants. We tested the hypothesis that this exercise modality would increase counter-regulatory hormones and limit BG decrease in glargine/glulisine insulin analogs users. Findings: Participants performed, in a repeated measures, random-ordered design, 60 minutes of moderate intensity exercise at 50% VO2peak in the following conditions: ingestion of 0 g of glucose pre-exercise, 30 g of glucose pre-exercise, or 0 g of glucose preexercise, but interspersed with brief high intensity intervals every 2 minutes. Intermittent brief high intensity exercise significantly increased levels of norepinephrine at mid-exercise (from 3.2±1.0 to 7.8±3.2 nmol/l) and cortisol from mid-exercise (from 330±159 to 606±285 nmol/l) to even after exercise (692±334 nmol/l) compared to other conditions. Conclusions: Our results suggest that an intermittent high intensity exercise raised counter-regulatory hormones which may contribute to the prevention of exercise-induced hypoglycaemia in participants with type 1 diabetes using glargine/glulisine. Such exercise regimen can be an alternative to prevent exercise-induced hypoglycemia in glargine/glulisine users as seen in other insulin combinations.