There’s no messing around with type 2 diabetes. According to statistics, in fact, one in three people develops a pathology called chronic kidney disease, which may require dialysis and even a kidney transplant. Life expectancy for these patients is reduced by up to 16 years. Something, however, can be done: new data, collected in over 50 Italian diabetes centers, confirm the long-term effectiveness of dapagliflozin in protecting people with type 2 diabetes from kidney damage compared to other classes of antidiabetic drugs.
A studio made in Italy
As Gian Paolo Fadini, full professor of endocrinology at the University of Padua, explains, the superiority of treatment with dapagliflozin (a selective inhibitor of renal glucose reabsorption with oral administration once a day) emerges from the DARWIN-Renal study, a trial multicenter and observational project promoted by the Italian Society of Diabetology (SID) and the SID Study Center, with the non-conditioning support of AstraZeneca. DARWIN-Renal evaluated more than 12 thousand people with type 2 diabetes and is the first and largest clinical study on this topic totally conducted in the Italian real-world diabetes clinic.
“Compared to patients treated with other classes of antidiabetic drugs – specifies Fadini – patients treated with dapagliflozin were significantly protected from the decline in renal function, from the increase in albuminuria and from the onset of an adverse renal outcome leading to dialysis and transplant”.
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Prevent kidney damage
Specifically, in the DARWIN-Renal Study, dapagliflozin achieved the primary efficacy endpoint of protecting renal function by demonstrating, over a period of 2 and a half years, a significant reduction in the decline in eGFR (indicator of renal filtering capacity) equal to at 1.81 ml/min/1.73 m2 compared to other drug classes available for the treatment of type 2 diabetes, including GLP-1 receptor agonists.
Additionally, dapagliflozin demonstrated significant efficacy in reducing the relative risk of new onset chronic kidney disease by 24% and loss of kidney function by 31% compared to other classes of diabetes medications.
“It is very important to underline – adds Fadini – that these results were also achieved in the condition of so-called primary prevention, i.e. in people with diabetes but without any initial evidence of kidney damage”. The study, in fact, included people with type 2 diabetes with various stages of renal impairment, including those who, at the beginning of the observation, had no renal damage (low renal risk), demonstrating that the protective action of dapagliflozin on the kidney occurs regardless of the degree of renal impairment.
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“As the Italian Society of Diabetology we are proud to have promoted the DARWIN Study, the first and largest real-world comparative study in Italian diabetology, whose results, the result of the scientific work of Italian diabetologists, represent very important news for the health of people with diabetes. The Study confirms the significant efficacy of dapagliflozin in renal protection, highlighting its potential impact on reducing the onset of chronic kidney disease – underlines Angelo Avogaro, President of SID. This study adds to existing evidence and further supports the effectiveness of dapagliflozin in preventing the onset and worsening of chronic kidney disease in people with type 2 diabetes even at low renal risk compared to the use of other drugs, demonstrating protection unprecedented renal failure.”