¹Pharmacology and Toxicology department, College of pharmacy, Al-Nahrain University, Baghdad, Iraq
²Department of Physiology, College of Medicine, Al-Nahrain University, Baghdad, Iraq
³Medical Research Unit, College of Medicine, Al‐Nahrain University, Baghdad, Iraq DOI : 10.29228/jrp.2022.00 Finding a feasible test for screening for insulin resistance (IR) in healthy adults can significantly reduce the incidence of plethora of metabolic and cardiovascular diseases and for this reason the current study was aimed to evaluate the prognostic value of peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor γ (PPAR-γ) gene expression and global DNA methylation in prediction of IR in healthy adults in a cross-sectional study conducted on 100 euglycemic, non-diabetic apparently healthy adults of both sexes, aged ≥45 years old with HbA1C ≤6.5%, who were categorized into insulin sensitive (IS) and IR according to Homeostatic Model Assessment of IR (HOMA-IR). Global DNA methylation was estimated with enzyme linked immune-sorbent assay using a ready commercial kit. Quantitative polymerase chain reaction (qPCR) was used to estimate PPAR-γ gene expression in relation reference gene and the results revealed that out of 100 apparently healthy subjects, 30 subjects (30%) had IR. The ΔCt of PPARγ gene was significantly lower in the IR individuals (6.49±2.46) in comparison to 8.13±1.37 of the IS individuals. However, it has relative low sensitivity and specificity (56% and 53%, respectively). There was no significant difference between individual with and without IR in the intensity of global DNA methylation that may lead to conclude that PPAR-γ gene expression is significantly reduced in individuals with IR; however, it cannot be used as a screening test for IR, due to low sensitivity and specificity. Global DNA methylation seems to have no association with IR. Keywords : Global DNA methylation; homeostatic model assessment; insulin resistance; peroxisome proliferate activator receptor-γ gene; type 2 diabetes