Critical evaluation of the combined model approach for estimation of pre-hepatic insulin secretion. Watanabe, Richard M., Garry M. Steil, and Richard N. Bergman. University of Southern California, Department of Exercise Science, Los Angeles, CA, University of Southern California School of Medicine, Department of Physiology & Biophysics, Los Angeles, CA
APStracts 4:0206E, 1997.
The Combined Model approach uses kinetic analysis of both plasma insulin and C-peptide dynamics to estimate pre-hepatic insulin secretion rates and parameters of insulin and C-peptide kinetics. The original model utilized single compartment kinetics to describe both insulin and C-peptide despite knowledge that C-peptide follows two -compartment kinetics. The performance of the model under rapidly changing secretory conditions has come into question. Thus, a more complex Combined Model is introduced incorporating two compartmental C-peptide disappearance. The addition of two-compartment C-peptide kinetics required a novel numerical approach to allow estimation of model parameters. This simulation study was undertaken to 1) compare the performance of the original Combined Model and 2) examine the numerical method used to identify parameters for the extended Combined Model with two-compartment C-peptide kinetics under simulated conditions of rapidly changing insulin and C-peptide. Monte-Carlo simulation revealed that the original Combined Model does not provide accurate estimates of pre-hepatic insulin secretion under rapid kinetics. However, the extended Combined Model provides accurate reconstruction of pre-hepatic insulin secretory profile without separate quantification of C-peptide kinetics.

Received 4 April 1997; accepted in final form 18 September 1997.
APS Manuscript Number E155-7.
Article publication pending Am. J. Physiol. (Endocrinol. Metab.).
ISSN 1080-4757 Copyright 1997 The American Physiological Society.
Published in APStracts on 7 October 1997