Revision of the oral glucose tolerance test: a pilot study

Nausea and vomiting have been recurrent problems with the oral glucose tolerance tests (OGTT) used to diagnose diabetes. We believe the nausea is associated with delayed gastric emptying caused by the high osmolarity of the glucose solution. In our pilot study, both the "standard" 100-g glucose OGTT and our new modified (lower osmolar) glucose solution were evaluated. Considerably delayed gastric emptying (along with severe nausea) was consistently noted with the standard OGTT. No nausea and a much more rapid gastric emptying time were recorded when the modified glucose solution was administered. We were able to diagnose diabetes (by using Wilkerson's point system) when our modified OGTT was administered to type 2 diabetics. We plan to develop a more physiological, more reproducible, and better tolerated OGTT to diagnose diabetes more accurately in the general population.