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Diabetics face higher risk with Avandia than Actos--study
by Neka Sehgal - June 29, 2010 - comments
The study suggests that for every aged patient who takes Avandia instead of Actos for one year, there would be one extra heart attack, heart failure, stroke, or death.
Just weeks before Avandia goes through a federal hearing to decide whether it should retain its place in the market as a safe diabetes medication, it took a beating with a new study linking it to life threatening problems.
According to researchers, the risk for cardiac events, specifically myocardial infarction, stroke, heart failure and death, is significantly higher in older patients who take Avandia than those opting for the rival drug, Actos.
Avandia, produced by the London-based pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline (GSK), and Actos, produced by Takeda Pharmaceuticals, headquartered in Osaka, Japan, both fall under the class of drugs called thiazolidinediones--insulin sensitizers that work by reducing the concentration of glucose in the blood.
They have been successfully used to treat Type 2 diabetes for nearly 10 years.
The popularity of Avandia in therapy has diminished in recent years as research began to emerge suggesting that the drug appears to be doing more harm than good when it comes to helping diabetics.
Lead researcher, David Graham, associate director for science and medicine in the Office of Surveillance and Epidemiology at the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) stated, "Our study shows very clearly that Avandia is much less safe than Actos in things that really matter -- things that will put you in the hospital or land you in the cemetery.
“There is no reason for a physician to prescribe Avandia to a patient with diabetes and there’s no reason for a patient with diabetes to accept treatment with Avandia because safer alternatives exist.”
A comparison between the two drugs revealed that older diabetics taking Avandia faced a 25 percent increased risk of heart failure compared to those on Actos. Moreover, Avandia also elevated the risk of stroke by 27 percent and that of death by 14 percent.
Medical records of 230,000 patients analyzed
The researchers analyzed Medicare records of nearly 230,000 type 2 diabetes patients who were aged 65 years and above.
The participants were undergoing treatment with either Avandia or Actos between July 2006 and June 2009.
Findings of the study
A comparison between the two drugs revealed that older diabetics taking Avandia faced a 25 percent increased risk of heart failure compared to those on Actos.
Moreover, Avandia also elevated the risk of stroke by 27 percent and that of death by 14 percent.
In other words, for every aged patient who takes Avandia instead of Actos for one year, there would be one extra heart attack, heart failure, stroke, or death.
Graham stated, "If you are a patient currently being treated with Avandia, based on the data from our study it would be wise for you to contact your doctor and ask to be switched to a safer alternative.
"Even if you have been on Avandia for a while and have not had anything bad happen to you, why take those risks? They are completely unnecessary."
The study has been released today in the Journal of the American Medical Association.