Measurement of interstitial muscle glucose and lactate concentrations during an oral glucose tolerance test

To study the relationship between blood flow rate and muscle metabolism, muscle microdialysis was performed in nine human subjects (5 females and 4 males) after an oral glucose load (75 g). Two microdialysis probes were inserted into the medial femoral muscle for estimation of glucose and lactate concentrations in the interstitial fluid, and the muscle blood flow was measured concomitantly with strain-gauge plethysmography. After subjects fasted overnight, their glucose concentration in arterial plasma and interstitial fluid was 4.6 +/- 0.13 vs. 3.8 +/- 0.23 mmol/l (P < 0.05), and the corresponding lactate concentrations were 0.60 +/- 0.07 vs. 0.83 +/- 0.07 mmol/l (P < 0.05). Muscle blood flow was 5.2 +/- 0.7 and 7.5 +/- 1.4 ml.100 g-1.min-1 (P < 0.05) at 0 and 90 min after oral glucose, respectively. The arterial-interstitial concentration differences of glucose increased after oral glucose [at 0 min 0.73 +/- 0.24 vs. 2.19 +/- 0.60 mmol/l at 90 min (P < 0.001)]. The corresponding values for lactate were -0.23 +/- 0.10 at 0 min vs.-0.26 +/- 0.18 mmol/l at 90 min (not significant). The data show that 1) the capillary wall is partly rate limiting for glucose uptake, and 2) after oral glucose, the glucose concentration gradient over the capillary wall increases despite a limited increase in blood flow rate, which then mediates approximately 10-20% of total enhancement of glucose uptake in muscle.