Because disturbances of gastric emptying are a serious complication in insulin-dependent diabetic subjects with regard to the maintenance of good metabolic control, we wanted to assess the effectiveness of motilin as a potential treatment for gastric emptying disturbances.
The intestinal hormone motilin has been shown to accelerate gastric emptying in healthy subjects. Therefore, we examined the effect of intravenous motilin on gastric emptying of a 99mTc colloid-labeled semisolid test meal in 9 insulin-dependent diabetic patients with diabetic gastroparesis. All patients had a significantly delayed gastric emptying rate compared with a group of 11 healthy control subjects.
During the infusion of motilin, gastric emptying was accelerated, and it was no longer significantly different from control values.
These data demonstrate that motilin and related compounds such as erythromycin derivatives could be useful for the treatment of disturbed gastric emptying in diabetic subjects.
