Short-term Cardio-Vascular Risk Score Changes in Type 2 Diabetic Patients on Empaglifozin: A Real-Life Clinical Experience.
Empagliflozin is a highly selective SGLT2i improving glycemic control in patients with T2DM both per se and when added to metformin, sulfonylurea, or insulin.13-15 In the Empa-Reg outcome study, when added to standard care in patients with T2DM and a high cardiovascular (CV) risk, empagliflozin reduced CV events, mortality and hospitalization as compared to placebo during a 48 month observation-period [Empa-Reg outcome]. Efficacy data reported so far for SGLT2
is derived from randomized clinical trials, while those from “clinical practice” are still missing.
Due to that, some of the most common questions posed by patients at the time of diagnosis, i.e. “Will my disease be worse?” or “Will I get worse?”, in real life get highly variable answers by their doctors, who mostly talk about their own experience and, even when referring to large randomized controlled trials (RCTs), can only base their predictions on forecast risks derived from relatively short-duration (4 years at most) validated data.
The aim of our study was to verify the short-term efficacy and safety of empaglifozin under real life conditions in an attempt to provide appropriate answers to the above mentioned questions. To achieve that we evaluated our diabetic patients for 6-month changes in their metabolically relevant parameters and 10-year CV risk score (10-y CVrs).
In conclusion, our results confirmed empaglifozin efficacy in terms of persistent control of both glucose and virtually all other cardiovascular risk factors (weight, BMI, blood pressure, lipids,
uric acid). As a consequence of that, the 10-year Cardiovascular Risk (CRA) score significantly decreased in diabetic patients without previous major cardiovascular events.
Heart Res Open J. 2017; 4(3): 46-56. doi: 10.17140/HROJ-4-141
