Potential Drug Combinations to Reduce Cardiovascular Disease Burden in Diabetes.

The major cause of death and complications in patients with type 2 diabetes (T2DM) is cardiovascular disease (CVD). More than 60% of all patients with T2DM die of CVD, and an even greater percentage have serious complications. The impact of glucose lowering on cardiovascular complications is a hotly debated issue and recent large clinical trials reported no significant decrease in cardiovascular events with intensive glucose control. Risk remains high even after correcting diabetes-associated dyslipidemia with drugs such as fibrates and niacin. Data from several clinical studies show that postprandial glucose and lipids have a strong predictive value on myocardial infarction (MI) and mortality. However, strategies to reduce postprandial hyperglycemia and/or lipemia through increased utilization of glucose and/or triglycerides (TG) have been shown to not be effective in reducing the CVD burden. In this review, I discus the preferred ways to reduce postprandial glucose and TG with combinations of currently marketed drugs with potential benefit in CVD.