Best Of: Flow and Grow Drugs Can Trigger Diabetes

Vidcast:  https://youtu.be/GJhARotY-eA   The drugs in question are those that make men’s urine flow and their hair grow.  Many men take finasteride, better known as Proscar and Propecia, to shrink their prostates to improve urine flow and others take the same medicine help hair grow on their scalps.     A new study from Scotland’s University of Edinburgh reveals that this drug and its cousin dutasteride (Avodart), technically known as 5-alpha-reductase inhibitors, can make the body less sensitive to insulin and induce type 2 diabetes.   The investigators reviewed health records from 55,000 men in the UK each of whom been taking these drugs over an 11 year period.  They discovered that this drug increases a man’s chances of developing diabetes by about 33%.   Finasteride and dutasteride are effective and popular.  Experts agree that these medications may be continued, but they add the sound medical advice that dictates close followup and surveillance of the users carbohydrate handling capabilities.  In simple terms, long term user’s docs should check them for diabetes periodically.   Li Wei, Edward Chia-Cheng Lai, Yea-Huei Kao-Yang, Brian R Walker, Thomas M MacDonald, Ruth Andrew. Incidence of type 2 diabetes mellitus in men receiving steroid 5α-reductase inhibitors: population based cohort study. BMJ, 2019; l1204 DOI: 10.1136/bmj.l1204   #finasteride #dutasteride #diabetes