A new study highlighted Monday the potential benefits of popular diabetes drugs on a wide range of health issues including dementia and cardiovascular diseases, although experts warned against seeing them as miracle drugs.
The study published in Nature Medicine is unique in its scope, marking a milestone in the study of new-generation weight-loss drugs such as Ozempic, Wegovy and Mounjaro, which have already somewhat revolutionised the fight against obesity.
“No one had comprehensively investigated the effectiveness and the risks of GLP-1 receptor agonists across all health outcomes,” said epidemiologist Ziyad Al-Aly at a press conference Monday.
GLP-1 medications, which first came on the market about a decade ago, combat obesity and related conditions by mimicking the function of a hormone that secretes insulin, slows down the emptying of the stomach and suppresses appetite.
They are widely considered as one of the great medical developments of the last few years, generating colossal revenues for drugmakers such as Novo Nordisk (Ozempic/Wegovy) and Eli Lilly (Mounjaro).
Multiple studies had already shown that their benefits might go beyond weight loss and diabetes.
Those studies showed that patients taking GLP-1 medication fared better against a wide range of health problems such as dementia, cardiovascular diseases or alcohol addiction.
Monday’s vast study confirmed the findings of the previous research, also bringing more specific information about the drugs’ promising effects.
Researchers carried out their investigation in the United States, using health data from hundreds of thousands of veterans.
They compared two groups of diabetics: one receiving standard treatment, the other on GLP-1 medication.
The GLP-1 patients had “a lower risk of drug use, psychological or convulsive disorders, neurocognitive disorders, including Alzheimer’s disease and other types of dementia, coagulation and cardiometabolic disorders, infectious diseases and various respiratory pathologies,” the study found.
A wide range of effects
Obesity is associated with multiple health problems, said Al-Aly, the epidemiologist, and GLP-1 drugs help patients lose weight.
But the researcher said the drugs could also potentially have a more direct impact.
“Biology is complex and GLP-1 receptors in the body are not controlling one thing” Al-Aly said.
Monday’s study marks a major milestone.
Until now, work on the potential of GLP-1 was scattered and no study had given such a broad overview of the drugs.
It also partially answers questions on the risks associated with this type of medication.
Patients taking GLP-1 often encounter digestive problems, however they don’t seem to have more suicidal thoughts than others, as had been reported in earlier studies.
But researchers say it is far too early to imagine that these drugs will become some sort of magical treatment for countless diseases.
The study drew its observations from people who were prescribed the medication, and doesn’t allow for the establishment of a causal link between the drugs and the diseases.
For that, full clinical tests, which can take years, would be necessary. And not all health problems receive the same level of attention.
Some clinical tests for cardiovascular disorders have provided good results and some are also well underway on Alzheimer’s disease.
But in other areas, such as alcohol addiction, very little is being done.
Also, the Nature Medicine study focuses on patients with a very specific profile, generally older men, supposedly all diabetic.
It is therefore impossible at this stage to generalise its conclusions.
Finally, the drugs’ effects are often light – in cases of dementia, the risk is lowered by just over one tenth.
“It’s important work,” pharmacologist Dipender Gill, who did not participate in the study but worked for years for Novo Nordisk, told AFP.
“The authors are clear that the research is exploratory, and to be used for discovery purposes.”
Gill cautioned that no patient should seek to take GLP-1 drugs based solely on the promises of this study.
