Table 2.

Clinical characteristics of healthy volunteers, prediabetes and T2DM patients. The numbers represent the mean of the measured levels. The uncertainties are standard deviations of the mean. *p < 0.05 was considered statistically significant between groups; ^¥Healthy volunteers compared with prediabetes patients; ^¤Healthy volunteers compared with T2DM patients; ^£Prediabetes patients compared with T2DM patients. FBG: fasting blood glucose levels, OGTT: glucose tolerance test, AST: aspartate aminotransferase, ALT: alanine aminotransferase, CRP: C reactive protein, BUN: blood urea nitrogen, LDL: low density lipoprotein, HDL: high density lipoprotein

	Healthy Volunteers (n = 37)	Prediabetes (n = 47)	T2DM (n = 43)	p-value
HbA1c (%)	5.40 ± 0.28	5.72 ± 0.33	8.54 ± 2.99	< 0.001¥ < 0.001¤
FBG (mg/dL)	85.54 ± 6.77	106.13 ± 6.37	159.72 ± 67.75	< 0.001¥ < 0.001¤
OGTT (mg/dL)	113.83 ± 21.49	127.19 ± 31.33	224.50 ± 105.54	< 0.001¤ < 0.001¤
ALT (U/L)	20.29 ± 9.42	22.52 ± 10.95	35.55 ± 28.46	0.005¤ 0.011£
AST (U/L)	19.40 ± 4.49	19.93 ± 5.01	27.57 ±18.42
CRP (mg/dL)	3.69 ± 5.11	4.81 ± 4.56	8.03 ± 11.25	0.019¥ 0.018¤
BUN (mg/dL)	12.17 ± 3.15	12.62 ± 4.09	13.59 ± 6.93
Total Cholesterol (mg/dL)	212.86 ± 39.81	211.36 ± 30.95	214.16 ± 49.61
LDL (mg/dL)	136.86 ± 30.82	135.61 ± 28.21	133.19 ± 43.95
HDL (mg/dL)	53.16 ± 12.25	48.40 ± 12.44	42.95 ± 8.30	0.001 ¤
Triglycerides (mg/dL)	112.91 ± 62.08	141.40 ± 70.74	192.76 ± 126.33