AstraZeneca’s Diabetes Drug Shows Significant Benefits in Patients with Heart Failure

MUMBAI:
Studies indicate that every 8 th Heart Failure patient in the world is an Indian of which 40% also has underlying diabetes. HF is the first complication of type 2 diabetes related Cardiovascular disease presenting high mortality risk. As per Global data, nearly 50% of patients diagnosed with Heart Failure succumb within 5 years.

This is partly due to the fact that the HF symptoms such as breathlessness and fatigue are often confused with anemia or other common lung disease. With the increasing prevalence of diabetes in India, affecting more than 65 million patients, there is an urgent need to realize and prevent heart failure complications early in the diabetes treatment journey.

Astrazeneca, one of the top 10 bio-pharmaceutical organisation in the world, today announced the full results from its DAPA -HF clinical trials of it’s latest diabetes drug, dapagliflozin, showing significant benefits for the treatment of patients with heart failure, with and without type-2 diabetes. The detailed results of the trial presented today at the ESC Congress 2019 in Paris, France, showed Forxiga reduced the composite of cardiovascular (CV) death or worsening of heart failure by 26% and showed a reduction in each of the individual components of the composite endpoint. This is specially exciting , since nearly one fourth of the patients in the trail were Asian, including Indians.

Dr.Jamshed Dalal is Director, Cardiac Sciences at Kokilaben Dhirubhai Ambani Hospital commenting on the results stated, “The Dapa HF Trial showed that this drug showed superiority in patients with heart disease and heart failure. There were no additional safety concerns. This is good news for patients with either diabetes or heart disease and specially for those who have both, a combination which is common in India. “

Dr. AG Unnikrishnan is the CEO and Chief of Endocrinology at the Chellaram Diabetes Institute, a state-of-the-art diabetes institute in Pune, mentioned, “People with diabetes are at a higher risk of heart failure, a condition where the heart does not pump out blood appropriately . The risk is twofold higher in men and five fold higher in women who have diabetes, when compared to people without diabetes . Moreover, the risks of developing heart failure increases with increasing levels of HbA1c, which is a measure of high blood glucose over the last three months. Subjects with heart failure usually present to the doctor with breathlessness and swelling of the feet when the condition is more severe. However, in milder cases of heart failure, the diagnosis may not not made early on, as symptoms may be subtler. Clinical experience suggests that when people with diabetes complain of unexplained fatigue, breathing difficulty or mild swelling of the extremities, heart failure should be suspected, especially if there is a prior history of a heart attack or a related heart disease.

Heart failure should be diagnosed early as it is potentially dangerous : data suggests that mortality rates could be as high as 50% after 5 years from the initial diagnosis of the disease. Early diagnosis and appropriate management of heart failure in diabetes could reduce mortality and improve the quality of life of subjects suffering from this illness ”

This is the only SGLT2 inhibitor that has shown significant benefits in the treatment of heart failure in adult patients with and without type-2 diabetes.