At the end of August, the FDA announced that certain medications used to treat diabetes had been linked to cases of a rare, potentially deadly flesh-eating genital infection. The medications are sodium-glucose cotransporter-2 (SGLT2) inhibitors, used in the treatment of type 2 diabetes. Click here for the FDA list of affected drugs, among which are Invokana, Farxiga, and Jardiance.
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The infection, “necrotizing fasciitis of the perineum” (also called “Fournier’s gangrene”) is rare and affects the genital region. According to a 2012 study, it has a mortality rate of more than 20 percent. (The term necrotizing fasciitis is more commonly known as “flesh-eating bacteria.”)
“The warning comes after the FDA identified 12 cases of the disease in patients taking an SGLT2 inhibitor over the course of 5 years, between March 2013 to May 2018. That’s compared to only six recorded cases in more than 30 years in patients taking other antidiabetic drug classes, the FDA says.
Of the 12 cases studied, all patients required surgery, with some surgeries disfiguring in nature. One patient died, the FDA reported.”1
If you are taking one of the drugs listed by the FDA, seek medical treatment if you experience “tenderness, redness, or swelling of the genitals or the area from the genitals back to the rectum and have a fever above 100.4 F or a general feeling of being unwell.”2
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These SGLT2 inhibitors were first approved by the FDA in 2013 and are used in conjunction with diet and exercise to help lower blood sugar in patients with type 2 diabetes. If you have diabetes and are on these medications, please be careful. However, if you are willing to do the hard work, this community can walk alongside you while you make different food and exercise choices. Choices that could see you not need these medications anymore.
XO- Erin
