Patients treated with dasatinib had mean reduction in serum glucose concentration and relative decrease in body weight<\/p>\n<\/h3>\n
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WEDNESDAY, Nov. 24, 2021 (HealthDay News) — The senolytic agent dasatinib, which is often used to treat tumors and malignant tissue, has beneficial effects among patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus, according to a study published online Nov. 9 in the Mayo Clinic Proceedings<\/em>.<\/p>\n Omid Salaami, M.D., from Duke University in Durham, North Carolina, and colleagues conducted a retrospective cohort study to examine outcomes after one year for a strongly senolytic tyrosine kinase inhibitor, dasatinib, compared with a weakly senolytic tyrosine kinase inhibitor, imatinib, in older patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus (16 and 32 patients, respectively).<\/p>\n The researchers found that dasatinib-treated patients had a 43.7-mg\/dL mean reduction in serum glucose concentration relative to imatinib and needed 28.8 fewer total daily insulin units, with a 4.8-kg relative weight loss (5.3 percent of total body weight). The relative difference in weight accounted for 19.2 percent of the decrease in blood glucose (8.4 of the 43.7 mg\/dL decrease). Patients treated with dasatinib had a mean 0.80 absolute-point decrease in hemoglobin A1c relative to imatinib, and they required 18.2 fewer total daily insulin units, with a decrease of 5.9 kg in relative weight loss (6.3 percent of total body weight).<\/p>\n “Our findings suggest that dasatinib or related senolytic drugs may become novel diabetic therapies. Future studies are needed to determine whether these findings can be translated to patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus but without underlying malignant disease,” the authors write.<\/p>\n Patents on senolytic drugs are held by Mayo Clinic, which is where the study patients were located. <\/p>\n