High Prevalence of Insulin Resistance in Asymptomatic Patients with Acute Intermittent Porphyria and Liver-Targeted Insulin as a Novel Therapeutic Approach

Acute porphyria attacks are associated with the strong up-regulation of hepatic heme synthesis and over-production of neurotoxic heme precursors. First-line therapy is based on carbohydrate loading. However, altered glucose homeostasis could affect its efficacy. Our first aim was to investigate the prevalence of insulin resistance (IR) in an observational case-control study including 44 Spanish patients with acute intermittent porphyria (AIP) and 55 age-, gender- and BMI-matched control volunteers. Eight patients (18.2%) and one control (2.3%, p = 0.01) showed a high HOMA-IR index (cut-off ≥ 3.4). Patients with IR and hyperinsulinemia showed clinically stable disease. Thus, the second aim was to evaluate the effect of the co-administration of glucose and a fast-acting or new liver-targeted insulin (the fusion protein of insulin and apolipoprotein A-I, Ins-ApoAI) in AIP mice. The combination of glucose and the Ins-ApoAI promoted partial but sustained protection against hepatic heme synthesis up-regulation compared with glucose alone or co-injected with fast-acting insulin. In a prevention study, Ins-ApoAI improved symptoms associated with a phenobarbital-induced attack but maintained high porphyrin precursor excretion, probably due to the induction of hepatic mitochondrial biogenesis mediated by apolipoprotein A-I. In conclusion, a high prevalence of IR and hyperinsulinemia was observed in patients with AIP. The experimental data provide proof-of-concept for liver-targeted insulin as a way of enhancing glucose therapy for AIP.