There are many methods available to assess insulin sensitivity and resistance. Some methods rely on steady-state analyses and others on dynamic testing of glucose and insulin. In this Frontiers article of the American Journal of Physiology, Endocrinology and Metabolism, the procedure, concepts, advantages and appropriate usage, merits, limitations, and assumptions and considerations are summarized for each method. Since measuring insulin sensitivity and resistance is useful for many purposes, such as epidemiological studies, clinical and basic science investigations, and possibly in clinical practice, the article evaluates the usefulness of current approaches for specific purposes. For example, direct measures of insulin sensitivity are used mainly in basic science investigations, while simple surrogate indexes for insulin sensitivity/resistance are used mainly in epidemiological studies. The authors stress that the concepts underlying each method as well as their limitations and relative merits must be understood in order to identify the best way of measuring insulin sensitivity/resistance in different contexts.
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