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According to latest results from the Diabetes Prevention Program Outcomes Study (DPPOS), treatments to prevent type 2 diabetes continue to be effective an average of 15 years later, as presented at the 2014 American Diabetes Association Scientific Sessions.
The DPPOS was conducted as an extension of the DPP to assess the longer-term effects of the 2 interventions, including further reduction in diabetes development and whether delaying diabetes would reduce development of complications that can lead to blindness, kidney failure, amputations, and heart disease.
Original findings from the Diabetes Prevention Program (DPP) in 2001 showed that the study’s 2 interventions–a lifestyle program intervention and the drug metformin–decreased the development of type 2 diabetes in a group of high-risk patients by 58% and 31%, respectively.
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The new findings from DPPOS show that lifestyle intervention and metformin treatment have beneficial effects for years but they did not reduce microvascular complications. Patients assigned to lifestyle intervention and metformin during DPP continued to show lower rates of type 2 diabetes development (27% vs. 17% placebo) after 15 years. Regardless of type of initial treatment, researchers reported that patients who did not develop diabetes had a 28% lower occurrence of the microvascular complications than those who did develop diabetes.
For more information visit Diabetes.org.
