Counteracting heart failure with diabetes drugs: a review into the pharmacokinetic and pharmacodynamic properties.

Introduction: Heart failure (HF) is becoming a huge public health burden. New diabetes drugs for type 2 diabetes (T2D), sodium-glucose cotransporter type 2 inhibitors (SGLT2is), reduce the rate of hospitalization for HF in placebo-controlled trials.

Areas covered: Pharmacokinetics of dapagliflozin and empagliflozin (in presence of renal impairment and hepatic dysfunction, two comorbidities frequently associated with HF) and pharmacodynamic studies in patients with HF. Main HF outcomes in T2D patients with cardiovascular risk and in patients with reduced (HFrEF) or preserved (HFpEF) ejection fraction, with or without T2D, from DAPA-HF, EMPEROR-Reduced and EMPEROR-Preserved original findings and post hoc analyses.

Expert opinion: No clinically relevant changes are expected concerning SGLT2i pharmacokinetics in patients with HF while pharmacodynamic studies reported improvements in myocardium/vascular parameters, biomarkers, and functional status. All SGLT2is showed a remarkable reduction in hospitalization for HF in patients with T2D and high cardiovascular risk. Furthermore, both dapagliflozin and empagliflozin improved the prognosis of patients with HFrEF, independently of the presence of T2D. Similar results were reported with empagliflozin in patients with HFpEF, to be confirmed with dapagliflozin in an ongoing trial (DELIVER). Thus, SGLT2is offer a new opportunity for the prevention and management of HF in patients with or without T2D.