Taking two low-dose diabetes drugs may slow down the onset of type 2 diabetes according to a new study.
Everyday Health reports:
In people with pre-diabetes, a low-dose combination of two diabetes drugs — metformin and Avandia (rosiglitazone) — appeared to reduce the progression to type 2 diabetes, new research shows.
The study found that the risk of developing type 2 diabetes was reduced by two-thirds in those taking the drug combo compared to those on placebo.
“Diabetes is a complex metabolic disorder, and it’s unlikely that there will ever be one magic bullet that treats or prevents diabetes,” explained study author Dr. Bernard Zinman, director of the Leadership Sinai Centre for Diabetes at Mount Sinai Hospital and the University of Toronto. “So, more like treatments for HIV/AIDS or cancer that use a drug cocktail, we attempted to look at two drugs that have been known to have beneficial effects in diabetes.”
“We were pleasantly surprised to find that using half of the maximum dose was extremely effective for preventing type 2 diabetes,” he said.
In addition, Zinman said that the drug combination appeared to counteract the weight gain that’s common with Avandia therapy alone. He said that the researchers saw very few side effects in this study.
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