Cause and effect

“Metformin is an important drug used in the treatment and management of diabetes and taken regularly by millions of patients across India and the world. At the same time,the general belief has been that men do not get ostoeporosis and basically it is the female population which is at risk. Vit B12 deficiency has also been typically linked to vegetarians. The new study indicates that all these beliefs may not hold true in the case of Metformin users,” explained Singh.

Talking about the study undertaken by him at Fortis and what was discussed at the meeting in Australia,Dr Singh said,“In Sydney,we discussed three cases of osteoporosis – spine and hips among patients who were using Metformin regularly and had also been detected as Vit B12 deficient. Since we wanted to understand whether men could get osteoporosis,we deliberately selected three adult male,aged 49,54 and 56 years who had been on Metformin for the past two years for treatment of diabetes.” “Detailed clinical history was recorded and our findings clearly indicated Metformin induced Vit B12 deficiency and this highlighted the importance of the complex process of osteoporosis and its correlation with Vit B12 deficiency. It showed that,in such cases,men were at equal risk of getting osteoporosis as women and such a linkage had been observed for the first time in the world,” Dr Singh stated.