Diabetes pill that lowers blood sugar levels can also slash heart risks in elderly

A diabetes pill that lowers blood sugar levels can also slash the risk of heart attacks and strokes in older people, a study has found.

Experts are now calling for NHS guidance – which does not recommend managing diabetes with different drugs depending on age – to be updated in light of the findings.

The tablets, known collectively as sodium-glucose co-transporter-2 inhibitors, or SGLT2 inhibitors, are designed to lower blood sugar levels.

Over four million people in the UK have been diagnosed with diabetes. Half of them are aged over 65 and a quarter are over 75, while nearly 15 per cent of over 85s have the condition.

Older people with diabetes are at greater risk of heart failure and strokes. SGLT2 inhibitors, which include the daily tablets empagliflozin and dapagliflozin already available on the NHS, help the kidneys remove excess sugar. 

This helps combat the illness but they also come with a range of other health benefits, including slowing kidney disease.

In June 2021, The Mail on Sunday revealed that a Leeds University trial found that when type 2 diabetes patients were given empagliflozin it appeared to strengthen the heart.

The latest study, carried out by a group of researchers at the University of Glasgow, analysed data from 300,000 patients. The meta-analysis assessed 600 trials of diabetes drugs worldwide and found that SGLT2 was associated with a reduced risk of heart attacks and strokes in older people.

‘Deciding on the best treatments for older people always requires careful balancing of risks and benefits,’ says Dr Peter Hanlon, a clinical research fellow at the University of Glasgow.

‘Our findings that older people experienced greater benefits from these drugs, in terms of reduced heart attacks and strokes, are very encouraging.

‘Age alone should not be a barrier to treatments with proven benefits, as long as they are well tolerated and align with patients’ priorities.’