In a new study, researchers found that drugs known as sodium-glucose cotransporter 2 (SGLT2) inhibitors are linked to a lower risk of major heart problems in people with type 2 diabetes.
They found the short term use of SGLT2 inhibitors was linked to a decreased risk of heart disease events among people with type 2 diabetes, although further studies are needed to determine if these benefits persist long term.
The research was conducted by a team at McGill University and elsewhere.
Previous studies have shown that SGLT2 inhibitors can reduce the risk of heart conditions such as heart attack, stroke, and heart failure compared with placebo.
But some of these trials had important limitations, making it difficult to interpret the results, and data on the effects of individual SGLT2 inhibitors on the heart are limited.
In the study, the team compared the risk of cardiovascular events between drugs SGLT2 inhibitors and drugs DPP-4 inhibitors among adults with type 2 diabetes.
Their findings are based on healthcare data from seven Canadian provinces and the United Kingdom from 2013-18 (a total of 209,867 new users of an SGLT2 inhibitor matched to 209,867 users of a DPP-4 inhibitor).
Major cardiovascular events (a combination of heart attack, stroke or cardiovascular death), as well as heart failure and death from any cause (“all-cause mortality”), were recorded for an average of 11 months.
The team found compared with DPP-4 inhibitors, SGLT2 inhibitors were linked to a reduced risk of heart attack, stroke or heart death combined.
SGLT2 inhibitors were also linked to decreased risks of individual events. For example, heart attack (5.1 v 6.4 events per 1000 person-years), cardiovascular death (3.9 v 7.7 events per 1000 person-years), heart failure (3.1 v 7.7 events per 1000 person-years), and all-cause mortality (8.7 v 17.3 events per 1000 person-years).
However, SGLT2 inhibitors had more modest benefits for stroke (2.6 v 3.5 events per 1000 person-years).
These findings suggest that SGLT2 inhibitors offer heart benefits among people with type 2 diabetes in a real-world setting.
One author of the study is Kristian B Filion, an associate professor of medicine and epidemiology.
The study is published in The BMJ.
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