Chen Y, Dai MT, Gong GH. L-arginine overdose is a potential risk factor for myocardial injury in patients with type 2 diabetes. World J Diabetes 2025; 16(5): 104409 [DOI: 10.4239/wjd.v16.i5.104409]
Corresponding Author of This Article
Guo-Hua Gong, School of Laboratory Medicine and Life Sciences, Wenzhou Medical University, No. 82 West College Road, Wenzhou 325035, Zhejiang Province, China. guohgong@wmu.edu.cn
Research Domain of This Article
Medicine, Research & Experimental
Article-Type of This Article
Letter to the Editor
Open-Access Policy of This Article
This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
World J Diabetes. May 15, 2025; 16(5): 104409 Published online May 15, 2025. doi: 10.4239/wjd.v16.i5.104409
L-arginine overdose is a potential risk factor for myocardial injury in patients with type 2 diabetes
Yan Chen, Meng-Ting Dai, Guo-Hua Gong
Yan Chen, Meng-Ting Dai, Guo-Hua Gong, School of Laboratory Medicine and Life Sciences, Wenzhou Medical University, Wenzhou 325035, Zhejiang Province, China
Author contributions: Chen Y, Dai MT, and Gong GH contributed to this paper; Gong G designed the overall concept and outline of the manuscript; Chen Y and Dai MT contributed to the discussion of the literature and design of the manuscript; Chen Y and Gong GH contributed to the writing and editing of the manuscript.
Supported by The Medical Health Science and Technology Project of Zhejiang Provincial Health Commission, No. 2024KY138; The Basic Research Project of Wenzhou Municipal Science and Technology Bureau, No. Y20240008; The Key Discipline of Zhejiang Province in Medical Technology (First Class, Category A); and The Key Laboratory of School of Laboratory Medicine and Life Sciences, Wenzhou Medical University of China, No. JS2023003.
Conflict-of-interest statement: All the authors report no relevant conflicts of interest for this article.
Open Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: https://creativecommons.org/Licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Guo-Hua Gong, School of Laboratory Medicine and Life Sciences, Wenzhou Medical University, No. 82 West College Road, Wenzhou 325035, Zhejiang Province, China. guohgong@wmu.edu.cn
Received: January 6, 2025 Revised: February 24, 2025 Accepted: March 12, 2025 Published online: May 15, 2025 Processing time: 127 Days and 1.6 Hours
Abstract
We comment on an article published by Mansouri et al in the World Journal of Diabetes. L-arginine (L-Arg), a dietary supplement, is a precursor of nitric oxide, can improve cardiovascular disease, and it is important for treating heart disease and hypertension. Previous studies have demonstrated a beneficial effect of L-Arg on diabetes. In the study by Mansouri et al, L-Arg moderately increased blood glucose levels in normal rats. However, in diabetic rats, L-Arg significantly increased lipid levels, which is different from the findings of previous studies. This study demonstrated that a safe dose of 0.5 g/kg in diabetic rats can improve the lipid profile and decrease body weight. However, high doses (1 g/kg or higher) may aggravate damage to myocardial tissue in diabetic rats by increasing blood glucose, inflammation, and oxidative stress. Therefore, this study further demonstrated that high doses of L-Arg can exacerbate myocardial injury in diabetic patients.
Core Tip: The effect of L-arginine (L-Arg) daily administration is dependent on its dose in type II diabetes. Low-dose L-Arg is safe and good for diabetes. However, over 0.5 g/kg L-Arg is a risk factor for the heart. It may aggravate myocardial damage by increasing blood glucose levels, oxidative stress, inflammatory mediator levels, and cardiac remodeling.