Endocrine Abstracts

Background of Study: Some medications for the treatment of type 2 diabetes mellitus fail to achieve a continuous favorable glucose control in the long run during clinical use. Therefore we examined the durability of dipeptidyl peptidase-4 (DPP-4) inhibitor, sitagliptin which is relatively new to Japanese type 2 diabetic patients in clinical settings.

Objectives and Methods: 117 subjects (M/F=65/52, Age: 66±10 y.o., duration of diabetes 12±8 y. body weight 62 kg) received sitagliptin 50 mg q.d. and were followed up for 52 weeks. We observed HbA1c, body weight, blood pressure, and lipid profile. The percentage of concomitant use of sulfonylureas, biguanides, tiazolidinediones, alpha glucosidase inhibitors, and glinides are 63%, 45%, 28%, 20%, and 6% individually.

Results: Five subjects terminated medication due to loss of hypoglycemic potency and worsening patients’ condition. In the rest of 112 subjects, HbA1c was decreased from 7.89 to 7.00% (P<0.001), while there were no significant changes in body weight (62.2 to 62.2 kg), systolic blood pressure (133 to 131 mmHg) and lipid profiles (LDL-C: 111 to 108 mg/dl, HDL-C 55 to 56 mg/dl). The rate of achievement of HbA1c less than 6.9% was increased from 5 to 41%,and the frequency of decrement more than 0.4% was 66%. Contribution of HbA1c before the treatment was significant to the decrement of HbA1c, while there were no contributory effect of sex, age, the duration of diabetes, weight, combination medications and existence of complications. There were no serious adverse events.

Conclusions: Sitagliptin is a good therapeutic additive option to improve glycemic controls continuously in Japanese type 2 diabetic patients.

Declaration of interest: The authors declare that there is no conflict of interest that could be perceived as prejudicing the impartiality of the research project.

Funding: This research did not receive any specific grant from any funding agency in the public, commercial or not-for-profit sector.