Individuals with pre-diabetes and abdominal obesity will be randomized to either a donation group (DON) or a control group (CONT) in a double-blind fashion (RCT).~Insulin sensitivity during an oral glucose tolerance test (OGTT) and isotopically measured rate of appearance of endogenous and exogenous glucose will be measured on 2 occasions.~Two weeks prior to DON/CONT~Two weeks after to DON/CONT~Indexes of the bodily iron stores will be measured after DON/CONT to evaluate if the primary treatment was effective.
Studies in the literature suggest that people with obesity have an excess of stored iron. There is possibly an inverse relationship between ferritin levels and the actions of insulin on glycemic control. The reduction of stored iron by simply donating blood could result in improvements in glycemic control in people with obesity and prediabetes. We propose, to reduce ferritin levels through a standard donation of a unit of whole blood, and to measure if it positively affects glycemic control.