review · Diabetes Metabolic Syndrome and Obesity
Insulin normally exerts an inhibitory effect on platelets, but this mechanism is impaired during insulin resistance, resulting in platelet hyperactivity. Standard clinical methods for measuring insulin resistance are expensive and complex, which limits their regular use in standard healthcare practice. Common platelet parameters, including mean platelet volume, platelet count, and platelet distribution width, represent accessible and affordable biomarkers for the early diagnosis and prognosis of insulin resistance. Enhancing insulin sensitivity in patients can substantially decrease platelet activation and lessen the complications linked to hyperactive platelets. Adopting these widely available haematological markers offers significant advantages for clinical care, particularly within resource-constrained healthcare systems in developing nations where access to costly diagnostic tools is severely restricted.
Insulin resistance can lead to serious vascular complications, yet standard diagnostic tests are frequently unavailable or too expensive for everyday clinical practice. Utilising standard platelet measurements derived from routine blood tests provides an accessible, low-cost screening alternative. This approach supports earlier clinical intervention and better patient management, particularly in healthcare environments that lack advanced laboratory infrastructure.
The insight supports diagnostic applications that repurpose routine, low-cost haematology analysers to assess insulin resistance. Target users include diagnostic laboratories, clinics, and public health providers, especially in resource-constrained developing markets. As the evidence is derived from a narrative literature review rather than a proprietary clinical assay, the concept remains at an early research stage, requiring formal clinical validation and diagnostic protocol development before practical implementation.
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Background: Insulin has an inhibitory effect on platelets; however, this is compromised in circumstances of Insulin Resistance (IR), leading to platelet hyperactivity. Platelet parameters such as mean platelet volume, platelet count, and platelet distribution width are simple and accessible potential biomarkers for the early diagnosis and prognosis of IR. Therefore, the aim of this review is to provide insight on the current status of knowledge regarding IR-induced platelet hyperactivation and the potential biomarker role of platelet parameters. Methods: This narrative review included articles published in the English language. Searches were carried out at the electronic databases PubMed and Google Scholar. The search strategy was done by combining key words and related database-specific subject terms (Mesh terms) with the appropriate Boolean operators. Conclusion: Increasing insulin sensitivity in insulin resistant patients would possibly cause substantial reduction in platelet activation, which in turn reduce complications related with platelet hyperactivation. The standard methods to measure IR are not frequently employed in clinical practice due to their expensiveness and complexity. Thus, early detection of IR using a simple and more widely available biomarkers such as mean platelet volume, platelet count and platelet distribution width would be beneficial. Particularly in developing countries where resource scarcity is a major constraint of the health sector, utilizing such easy and affordable biomarkers may have a crucial role.
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DOI: 10.2147/dmso.s425469
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