Diabetes Drugs Put Patients at Risk of Death

Once you get diabetes, the only possible way to survive is to use specific drugs, or to take daily shots of insulin, depending on the form of the disease. But a new study shows that popular types of diabetes drugs actually put people at increased risks of heart failure and even death. Sulphonylureas and metformin, two of the most widely used drugs, have been shown in a scientific paper to have long-lasting, adverse effects on the human body, in spite of the fact that they are prescribed as safe by the industry and doctors.

The findings, which were published in the December 3 issue of the respected medical journal BMJ, also show that sulphonylureas is a lot more likely than metformin to elevate the risks a patient has of suffering heart failure, or dying. Both medications are used to treat Type II diabetes, experts say, and are often healthcare experts' first choice. The investigation also urges doctors and other personnel to favor metformin as the drug of choice in Type II diabetes, regardless of the brand name the substance has. The new results should be of concern to whoever suffers of this condition, and uses sulphonylureas-based compounds.

“The sulphonylureas, along with metformin, have long been considered the mainstay of drug treatment for type 2 diabetes. Our findings suggest a relatively unfavorable risk profile of sulphonylureas compared with metformin,” the authors write in the journal entry. For the investigation, the science team used data collected between 1990 and 2005, taken from the UK General Practice Research Database. The numbers covered more than 91,521 men and women, with an average age of 65. The group reveals that it has also taken into account possible factors that may have tainted the final results.

More than 180 million people worldwide suffer from Type II diabetes, so any trace of uncertainty that the drugs they are taking increase their risk of death should be taken into account seriously. The disease in itself is associated with large risks, including death caused by malfunctions of the cardiovascular system. It may be that sulphonylureas boosts these risks, causing an accelerated decay of patients' hearts and blood vessels. Both the American Diabetes Association and the International Diabetes Federation support the recommendations to make metformin the main Type II diabetes drug.