Top 5 Concerns Diabetes Patients Have About Medication
This article does not constitute a medical treatment recommendation. Until other treatment is being prescribed or recommended by your physician– there is no intent to advise any of the readers to stop taking his/her medication.
Most diabetics start their treatment with a relatively mild medication, like Metformin. However many fail to control glucose levels with the mild meds and end up getting prescribed several drugs – usually Metformin, Sulfonylurea’s, DPP-4’s or TZD’s. If these diabetes medications fail to provide the needed results, a patient, like the one quoted below, is prescribed injectable agents such as GLP-1 receptor agonists (Byetta, Victoza) or Insulin.
Patients have a difficult time to accept and adapt to the change and they have many valid concerns, knowing that each drug has side effects and conditions associated with it that can have a heavy impact on their quality of life.
A recent diabetes forum post by an overweight, type 2 diabetes patient, sums up some of the top concerns of diabetes patients faced with the need to begin insulin injections to keep their diabetes and blood sugar levels under control.
I’ve been on Meds for over 20 years but recent monitoring has my [blood glucose] at 300 and my doc said the pills no longer work so I have to take insulin which has me depressed. I’ve tried dieting but I last about 2 weeks and start eating junk again. I have a few questions and wonder how long someone can stay at 240 to 300 before complications set in? My last blood test showed liver and kidney functions were fine. A1c was 9.2 and my eye doctor said there were no diabetic complications… Will taking Lantus bring the count down? I dread taking the needle but guess this is the way to go. How long could I go with a count this high before something happens?(From a patient post at http://diabeticnetwork.com/community/DCForumID4/526.html)
So what are the top concerns that patients are expressing about their diabetes medications?
1. How will the drugs affect me and my lifestyle? Safety / Side Effects
Medications prescribed for diabetes, like any other medication, have many possible and some highly likely side effects. Those include, among others:
Risk of Hypoglycemia and Gastrointestinal symptoms such as nausea, vomiting etc.
There have also been findings suggesting increased cardiovascular and cancer risk with some anti diabetic medications leading to marketing cessation of some of them.
2. I don’t want to gain weight. Many people are not aware but one of the side effects of Insulin is actually weight gain. Of course most patients prefer not to gain weight and given that weight gain can exacerbate the diabetic condition, it is a serious side effect of Insulin.
3. How many pills is too many? Many diabetics take numerous pills daily to treat their diabetes as well as metabolic condition (hypertension, high cholesterol and triglyceride levels). A high pill burden (polypharmacy) increases the risk of drug-drug interactions and decreases patient compliance to treatment.
4. I don’t want to give myself injections. GLP-1 receptor agonists and insulin are given by injections once or even several times a day. These injections cause discomfort to the patient as well as a logistical nuisance (the need to carry medication in refrigeration and injection aids). Quality of life is severely impacted.
5. I can’t afford all these medications for the rest of my life. Diabetes Medications are costly accounting for 16.7% of drug cost growth in the US[1]. It is estimated that the annual individual cost related to diabetes is $7,380 in the US, $4,100 in France, over $4,000 in Austria, $3,800 in Germany and Australia and $3,570 in the UK. Since diabetes progressively deteriorates, patients can expect to need more severe treatment over time.
These are only some of the reasons patients so frequently try to postpone and avoid insulin injections and other medications for type 2 diabetes and are interested in safer and easier to handle alternatives. Discussing your concerns and the alternatives to insulin with your physician is the safest and smartest way to determine your options and best diabetes treatment program.