Background: Insulin resistance is seen as an important metabolic condition. This condition has to do with problems with glucose metabolism and fat metabolism and may be detected even before onset of type 2 diabetes. Being able to identify convenient and frequently available markers of IR is important for the early detection of the population that may be at risk of developing metabolic complications. This study evaluated the discriminatory performance of serum HDL-C for identifying IR in non-diabetic adults.
Methods: This case control study incorporated 75 non-diabetic individuals aged between 18 and 65 years originating from Al-Samawah, Iraq, with 50 subjects having IR and 25 as controls. FBG, fasting insulin, TG, HDL-C, waist circumference, weight, height, and BMI were studied. Insulin resistance was computed using the (HOMA-IR. Independent-samples t-test was carried out to determine the differences between the groups, whereas ROC curve analysis was utilized to assess the discriminatory capabilities of the various parameters used.
Results: People in the IR group had much lower HDL-C levels than those in the control group (40.82 ± 9.31 vs. 57.18 ± 11.86 mg/dL, P < 0.001). The IR group had significantly higher levels of TG, FBG, fasting insulin, HOMA-IR, and waist circumference compared to the control group. However, there was no significant difference in BMI levels between the two groups (P = 0.49). According to the analysis carried out with the help of the ROC curve, HDL-C has yielded the best results in terms of its ability to differentiate populations with the AUC equal to 0.879 (95% CI: 0.822–0.936; P < 0.001). It was followed by TG with the AUC value of 0.842, and FBG with AUC equal to 0.786, as well as fasting insulin with AUC of 0.758 and waist circumference with AUC of 0.681.
Conclusion: Serum HDL-C levels were significantly low in non-diabetic subjects with IR and it displayed the best distinguishing ability among the routine biochemical tests and anthropometric measurements. Hence, HDL-C can be considered as an easily accessible marker of elevated risk of IR. More future studies with larger sample size and validation should be done to prove the clinical value of this marker.