Half doses of diabetes drugs can prevent disease

Half doses of diabetes drugs can prevent diseaseTaking half a dose of Glaxo's combination pill reduced by two-thirds the risk that patients would go from having high blood sugar -- pre-diabetes -- to full type-2 diabetes,NHL jerseysthe researchers reported in the Lancet medical journal.

Candle WreathFourteen percent of the patients treated with the drugs developed diabetes after four years, compared to 39 percent of those given placebo, the researchers found.

The effect would likely be the same with Avandia's rival drug in the same class, Takeda's Actos, said Dr. Bernard Zinman of Mount Sinai Hospital at the University of Toronto, who led the study.

"I think it is a class effect,"NHL jerseysZinman said in a telephone interview.

Actos, known generically as pioglitazone and Avandia, known generically as rosiglitazone, belong to a class of drugs called thiazolidinediones, which help the body better use insulin.

Type-2 diabetes is caused as the body gradually loses its ability to respond to insulin, a condition called insulin resistance.Candle WreathOvereating, a lack of exercise, genes and other factors all play a role.

As insulin works less and less well, levels of glucose rise in the blood, damaging blood vessels and organs. The beta cells in the pancreas begins to lose their ability to make insulin.

Avandia and Actos work well to help and even prevent diabetes. But they have side-effects, including fluid retention, heart failure and,Candle Wreathpossibly,NHL jerseysheart attacks.