Biguanides Associate with Decreased Early Mortality and Risk of Acute Kidney Injury In Hospitalized COVID-19 Patients: a nationwide retrospective cohort study in Japan
Mari Sugimoto, Hiroaki Kikuchi, Eisei Sohara, Kavee Limbutara, Akihiro Hirakawa, Takayasu Mori, Koichiro Susa, Shuichiro Oya, Takefumi Suzuki, Soichiro Iimori, Kiyohide Fushimi, Shinichi Uchida
doi:10.1101/2024.07.20.24310736
Background: Biguanide (BG) is the most-prescribed oral glucose-lowering medication worldwide and has potential for further therapeutic applications. The Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic is a global public health emergency. Nevertheless, there are still no established low-cost treatments against COVID-19, of which the morbidity and mortality rates varing from country to country. Therefore, a nationwide study of the COVID-19 affected population is essential to explore therapeutic effect of BG against COVID-19. Methods: From the inpatient databases in Japan, covering the period from September 2021 to March 2023, which encompasses the era following the development of COVID-19 vaccines, we extracted data of 168,370 COVID-19 patients aged 20 to under 80 years who were suffered from diabetes mellitus treated with oral antidiabetic agents. The primary outcome was 100-day in-hospital mortality, and secondary outcome was the incidence of acute kidney injury (AKI) during hospitalization. We compared outcomes in patients who received BG with those in patients who did not, using a logistic regression analysis and Cox proportional hazards under both propensity score-unmatched and matched cohorts.
Results: The incidence of in-hospital death was significantly lower in the BG group
Disclosure The authors have declared that no conflict of interest exists.
Author contributions
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