Understanding Diabetes and Its Treatments
Do you know about a disease called diabetes? It is a condition where there’s too much sugar in your blood. This disease can be quite tricky, and it affects people differently.
For instance, did you know that type 2 diabetes can have different effects on men and women?
In type 2 diabetes, your body cannot use insulin properly, and this insulin is the hormone that helps control the sugar in your blood. To help manage this condition, doctors often prescribe different kinds of medicines.
Today, we’re going to talk about two types of these medicines: SGLT2 inhibitors (SGLT2i) and GLP-1 receptor agonists (GLP-1RA).
The Study: Men vs Women
A team of researchers at Monash University in Australia did an interesting study. They wanted to see if these two classes of diabetes medicines worked differently for men and women.
You see, women with type 2 diabetes are more likely to get heart problems than men with the same condition.
But, the treatments for diabetes-related heart problems are usually the same for both men and women. This made the researchers wonder if they could find a better way.
Exploring the Research
The researchers included 8,026 Australian men and women who were at least 30 years old and had type 2 diabetes.
These people were discharged from a hospital in Victoria between July 1, 2013, and July 1, 2017, and they had either SGLT2i or GLP-1RA within 60 days after leaving the hospital.
The researchers then checked on these people for about 756 days to see what happened to them.
The Findings: What Does the Study Say?
So, what did they find? They discovered that men who took SGLT2i had fewer major heart problems, like heart failure and stroke, than those who took GLP-1RA. In fact, these men had a 22% lower rate of these heart problems!
On the other hand, for women, both SGLT2i and GLP-1RA seemed to work about the same. There was no significant difference in the rates of major heart problems between women who took either medicine.
Interestingly, they also found that SGLT2i helped lower heart problem rates in older men and women who were at least 65 years old.
This drug also helped men who had a history of heart failure and women who already had a disease that hardens and narrows the arteries.
The Researchers’ Opinions
Abhipree Sharma, one of the researchers, said that the different results for men and women need more investigation.
She believes that the type of medicine doctors suggest for type 2 diabetes could depend on a person’s age and gender.
Professor Rebecca Ritchie, the team’s leader, added that women with type 2 diabetes are more likely to get heart problems than men. She believes this could be because of the way the female body responds to diabetes.
For instance, women with diabetes often have higher body mass indexes, more inflammation, and higher blood sugar and cholesterol levels than men with diabetes.
She also pointed out that the risk of heart problems increases in women after menopause, suggesting the hormone estrogen might protect women’s hearts.
Professor Ritchie hopes that their study will encourage more research on the best treatments for type 2 diabetes, considering factors like gender, age, and history of heart problems.
So, isn’t it fascinating to see how the same disease and the same treatments can affect different people in different ways?
This shows us how important it is to understand the differences among us and to make sure that everyone gets the best treatment for their unique situation.
If you care about diabetes, please read studies about how COVID-19 is linked to diabetes, and scientists find a new way to detect fatty liver disease accurately.
For more information about diabetes, please see recent studies that the Keto diet could benefit overweight people with diabetes, and results showing the Mediterranean diet could help reduce the diabetes risk by one-third.
The study was published in The Lancet Regional Health—Western Pacific.
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