An old reliable anti-diabetes drug

OUR baguio doctors, specialists in endocrinology and diabetes arrived a few days ago from almost simultaneous international conference in Portugal and Denmark, all of them with some disturbing news, if the incidence of diabetes is still news. After all, the whole world has become "sweeter"- no pun intended with almost 450 million diabetics in 2020, and to think that number does not really reflect the real incidence of the metabolic disorder considering that in developing countries, there is under reporting of cases. The Western Pacific which includes the Philippines has the biggest pie of the diabetic cake with 170 million patients. Every 19 seconds, a new diabetic is diagnosed and for every wink of an eye- 6 seconds- a diabetic dies.

By now, with trimedia working closely together to spread awareness of the disease, the public now knows the microvascular complications; first to be felt are the neuropathic signs and symptoms- sensory deficits like numbness and tingling sensations of the distal extremities -fingers and toes- then later motor- weakness, and worse, autonomic dysfunction which make a lot of diabetic males depressed with their inability to have their usual hard-rock penile erection. In the Philippines, the number 1 cause of dialysis is chronic kidney failure, which for the most part is due to uncontrolled diabetes leading t nephropathy. And we are all convinced that cataract is not only caused by aging but also due to diabetes and if the retinopathy has gone worst, blindness sets in.

The macrovascular complications are affectations of the bigger blood vessels like the coronaries- blood supply of the heart, which first lead to diastolic dysfunction and later on to a myocardiao infarctionheart attack. Or the cerebral arteries could be