Washington – The Food and Drug Administration has approved a Merck drug as the first combination pill for patients with diabetes who also have high cholesterol.
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Patients with both diabetes and high cholesterol are at increased risk for heart disease, stroke, kidney disease and other chronic conditions.
The drug Juvisync combines Merck’s diabetes pill Januvia with the popular cholesterol drug Zocor.
The American Diabetes Association recommends all people with diabetes over 40 take a cholesterol-lowering drug, known as a statin. But Merck scientists say many as 4 million diabetes patients in the U.S. are not following that recommendation.
About 20 million people in the U.S. have type 2 diabetes, which prevents them from properly breaking down carbohydrates. Patients with the condition are at a higher risk of a number of complications.
sounds great…what are the side effects?
Basically this is nothing new just 2 drugs combined into one pill. Merck will charge 400% for this “new” lifesaver, when you can buy the two drugs separately without going hungry.
Can a doctor out there please explain to me why this would be better for me than the 2 different pills I am now taking? (Forget the economics of this – just from a medical point of view.) I am trying to understand this, not comment one way or the other.