Glucagon-Like Peptide-1 Receptor Agonists and Risk of Macular Degeneration | Hacker News Reader

Glucagon-Like Peptide-1 Receptor Agonists and Risk of Macular Degeneration

jamanetwork.com

31 pointsbaby-yoda10 comments

> More than twice as many patients _with diabetes_ exposed to GLP-1 RAs developed nAMD compared to those in a matched cohort of similar patients who were unexposed.

Emphasis mine, but it's important context that probably wouldn't fit in the title.

Yes that's correct, I unfortunately had to summarize the title to fit the character limit.

139,000 patients, hazard went from 0.1 to 0.2%. It means that 139 new patients developed Macular Degeneration during 3 years. I would really consider the benefits of GLP-1 versus health gains to diabetic patients (specially regarding quality of life with macular degeneration)

Yeah I would not even consider this on my radar if I was overweight. The health risks from obesity are so far in excess of this.

Probably depends on your situation; if you're obese: absolutely. If you're just a bit overweight, perhaps not?

Of course hard to extrapolate to the general case from this study, as it only included patients over 66 with a diagnosis of diabetes.

I really wonder about this study. I'm not great at reading these things but the 'Design, Setting, and Participants' implies two groups, one that got it and one that didn't, but it doesn't say it was randomized meaning the ones that didn't get it had reasons for not getting it compared to the ones that did get it having reasons for getting it. This screams selection bias between the two groups. Maybe this is just pointing out that it is more likely to get the drug if you are more progressed in the disease. I'd really like to see how they controlled for something like this.

It's important to note that macular degeneration is caused by diabetes. So what would the rate of degeneration be without GLP-1s helping control blood sugar? My guess is much, much higher.

Based on some quick research, macular degeneration can be a higher risk for diabetics that also have diabetic retinopathy. Study from 2018: https://diabetesjournals.org/care/article/41/10/2202/36669/T...

> patients with diabetes

* patients with diabetes

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