A psychiatric study of patients referred with a diagnosis of hypoglycemia

Abstract

Five-hour oral glucose tolerance tests (GTTs) differentiated 30 volunteer patients who considered themselves hypoglycemic into three major groups: those who had reactive hypoglycemia, those who were normal, and those who had diabetes. Clinical psychiatric evaluation and Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory testing revealed that half of the 30 patients were experiencing a current psychiatric disorder, usually depression. Hysterical personality traits were also noted in many of the patients. The idea that reactive hypoglycemic patients have specific personality characteristics was not substantiated by the authors' data. They hypothesize that some patients with psychiatric illness may have their symptoms erroneously attributed to incidental GTT findings.