Original articles   

The Journal of Sports Medicine and Physical Fitness 2001 June;41(2):203-9

Copyright © 2002 EDIZIONI MINERVA MEDICA

language: English

Glucose tolerance during moderate prolonged exercise in women with oral contraceptives as compared to non-users

Boisseau N., Rannou F., Delamarche P., Bentue-Ferrer D., Gratas-Delamarche A.

From the Laboratoire de Physiologie et Biomécanique de l’Exercice Musculaire UFR-APS, Université de Rennes II * Laboratoire de Pharmacologie Faculté de Médecine, Rennes, France

Back­ground. The pur­pose of ­this ­study was to ­assess glu­co-se tol­er­ance dur­ing exer­cise in wom­en on ­oral con­tra­cep­tives.
Meth­ods. To ­this end, we inves­ti­gat­ed the ­effects of glu­cose inges­tion on glu­cose and hor­mo­nal respons­es in 7 wom­en on ­oral con­tra­cep­tives (OC(+); 21.3±1.3 yrs) and 7 nor­mal­ly men­stru­at­ing (OC(-); 22.6±1.3 yrs) dur­ing an ergoc­y­cle ­test (30 min, 60% V.O2max). ­Venous ­blood sam­ples ­were with­drawn at 0, 3, 5, 10, 15 and 30 min exer­cise and at the 30th min post­ex­er­cise. Glu­cose was ingest­ed per os (0.5 g·kg-1 b.w) ­between the 2nd and the 3rd min of the exer­cise.
­Results. ­Under rest­ing con­di­tion, plas­ma glu­cose and cat­e­chol­a­mine con­cen­tra­tions ­were sim­i­lar in ­both ­groups where­as plas­ma GH and insu­lin lev­els ­were great­er in OC(+) (p<0.05). Glu­cose/insu­lin ­ratio (G/I), ­used as an indi­ca­tor of insu­lin resis­tance, sug­gest­ed a ­reduced insu­lin sen­si­tiv­ity at ­rest in the OC(+) (p<0.05). No sig­nif­i­cant dif­fer­enc­es ­were ­observed ­between OC(+) and OC(–) in plas­ma glu­cose, insu­lin, and cat­e­chol­a­mine con­cen­tra­tions dur­ing exer­cise. Plas­ma GH val­ues were great­er in OC(+) ­from the 15th min of the exer­cise and dur­ing the recov­ery peri­od (p<0.01).
Conc­lu­sions. This ­study indi­cat­ed ­that ­oral glu­cose inges­tion at the ­onset of pro­longed sub­max­i­mal exer­cise ­induced sim­i­lar glu­cose tol­er­ance in wom­en tak­ing or not ­oral con­tra­cep­tives.