Ketone Bodies in Diabetes Mellitus: Friend or Foe?

In glucose-deprived conditions, ketone bodies are produced by the liver mitochondria, through the catabolism of fatty acids, and are used peripherally, as an alternative energy source. Ketones are produced in the body under normal conditions, including during pregnancy and the neonatal period, when following a ketogenic diet (KD), fasting, or exercising. Additionally, ketone synthesis is also augmented under pathological conditions, including cases of diabetic ketoacidosis (DKA), alcoholism, and several metabolic disorders. Nonetheless, diet is the main regulator of total body ketone concentrations. The KDs are mimicking the fasting state, altering the default metabolism towards the use of ketones as the primary fuel source. Recently, KD has gained recognition as a medical nutrition therapy for a plethora of metabolic conditions, including obesity and diabetes mellitus (DM). The present review aims to discuss the role of ketones, KDs, ketonemia, and ketonuria in DM, presenting all the available new evidence in a comprehensive manner.

• Publication year

  2023

• Venue

  Nutrients

• Publication date

  2023-10-01

• Fields of study

  Medicine

• Identifiers
  DOI 10.3390/nu15204383PMID 37892458PMCID 10609881
• External record

  Open on Semantic Scholar

• Source metadata

  Semantic Scholar, PubMed

• No claims are published for this paper.

• No concepts are published for this paper.

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