With healthspans falling at an alarming pace, the race is on to find a strategy that will keep us healthier for longer. One of the most common strategies is taking medications, like SGLT2 inhibitors: a prescription drug designed to combat our ever-increasing risk of heart failure.
If you’re living with diabetes, kidney disease, and/or heart disease, you may already be on one of these relatively new (and relatively expensive) drugs. The goal is to slow your disease progression and improve your quality of life, whether you’ve already suffered a heart attack or are at an extreme risk of one.
But while SGLT2 inhibitors can work in the short term for your health, they don’t necessarily provide you with anything you couldn’t do yourself. And staying on this medicine for an extended period may hurt more than it helps.
Let’s take a look at what the science says.
Article overview
- SGLT2 inhibitors are typically prescribed for patients suffering from a combination of type 2 diabetes, chronic kidney disease, and heart failure (CKD disease).
- While there are demonstrated benefits, the side effects may include UTIs, dehydration, diabetic ketoacidosis, bone density loss, and, in rare cases, gangrene leading to amputation.
- Certain lifestyle factors can replicate many of the benefits of SGLT2 inhibitors without the pharmaceutical side effects.
What is SGLT2?
SGLT2, or Sodium-Glucose Cotransporter 2, is a naturally occurring protein found in the kidneys. Its primary role is to reabsorb glucose (sugar) back into the blood after your kidneys have finished, which ensures your cells maintain energy.
So SGLT2 inhibitors, as you might imagine, prevent this process from happening. Sometimes referred to as ‘gliflozins,’ they allow excess glucose to be excreted in urine rather than preserved in the body. The overall goal is to lower your blood sugar over time.
You can easily imagine the benefits of these inhibitors: lower A1C scores, better blood glucose control, and potentially the prevention of disease progression.
But is all this maybe a little too good to be true?
Let’s look a little closer at both the benefits and drawbacks.
The benefits of SGLT2 inhibitors
It’s well-established that poor heart health and high sugar intake are directly associated with one another. Decreasing the amount of sugar in your body can prevent or slow the progression of heart disease.
SGLT2 inhibitors are positively linked with:
- Lowered blood pressure
- Decreased body weight
- Decreased major adverse cardiovascular events and death
So to summarize: if you’re someone who struggles to control their sugar, either because of diabetes or your existing diet, SGLT2 inhibitors can certainly help.
But it’s not a cure-all for people suffering from CKM. It could also potentially make things worse if you rely on it fully to ‘cure’ your heart health problems.
The drawbacks of SGLT2 inhibitors
Like any other medication, SGLT2 inhibitors come with potential side effects. Some of the most common include:
- UTIs and infections due to excessive sugar release in urine
- Osmotic diuresis, which can lead to both dehydration and electrolyte imbalances
- Diabetic ketoacidosis (DKA), which is potentially life-threatening
- Decreased bone mineral density and increased risk of fractures
- Increased risk of leg amputation due to cases of gangrene
- Negative interactions with diuretics and blood pressure medications
Even if you look past the side effects, a glaring issue remains: SGLT2 inhibitors do not address the root cause of heart failure and progressive cardiac diseases. They do not stop you from eating foods that contribute to type 2 diabetes and high blood sugar. They also don’t negate the side effects of other ingredients, including seed oils and preservatives.
Can SGLT2 inhibitors help you reduce sugar in the blood? Absolutely. But can they put your type 2 diabetes into remission? Not without major lifestyle changes to go along with it.
How to get the same benefits of SGLT2 without the medication
SGLT2 inhibitors have a definite use case. But like many other medications, there are side effects to consider and they may provide a false sense of security.
To protect your heart without relying solely on medications, all it takes is simply lifestyle factors you can start implementing today.
Adopt a low-carb diet
Cereals, grains, and other refined carbohydrates make it almost impossible to maintain a proper human diet. But by following an animal-based diet instead, such as keto or carnivore, you naturally reduce the amount of sugar present in your bloodstream. In essence, a much cheaper (and natural) SGLT2 ‘inhibitor.’
Not only are low-carb diets linked with improved blood sugar control, but they can also help put conditions like type 2 diabetes into remission.
So, does that mean other types of chronic diseases be cured? I’ll let you explore this rabbit trail yourself.
Cut sugar
The incredible amount of processed sugars in our food is staggering, with nearly three-fourths of all packaged items in the grocery store qualifying as ultra-processed. Studies link foods with added sugars directly to weight gain, insulin resistance, diabetes, and other metabolic pathologies.
So, to avoid needing to use SGLT2 in the first place, you may want to cut sugar by:
- Cooking at home
- Cutting back on snacking
- Avoiding sugary drinks, even those with added protein or probiotics
Regular exercise (particularly after you eat)
Regular exercise consumes glucose and glycogen, which are stores of sugar easily used by the body. This means that frequent bouts of movement can help reduce blood sugar, improve metabolic function, and help your heart pump blood more efficiently (which can decrease your chances of heart failure).
Keep in mind that ‘regular exercise’ can include postprandial walking, or simply taking a stroll around 10 to 15 minutes after you eat. Studies repeatedly show that this exercise can dramatically reduce blood sugar spikes after meals.
Again, there’s no need to take an SGLT2 inhibitor to remove excess sugar from your blood when you yourself can take actions that do this automatically.
Learn more about lowering your risks for heart failure
Contrary to what you might hear from certain healthfluencers, heart failure prevention does not require medications. Some, including SGLT2, can potentially cause new problems while fixing the targeted ones. The steps listed above come with none of the same side effects. They can also help you achieve similarly positive heart health outcomes without the potential drawbacks of medication.
This, of course, only scratches the surface. There’s quite a lot to know about the treatment of heart conditions from a lifestyle perspective.
Below are further resources to help you get a better idea of how to prevent heart disease or manage existing conditions:
- How you can protect your health with preventive heart care
- Strategies to prevent heart disease
- How to prevent a heart attack
- The most accurate measures of heart disease risk
- How to recover from a heart attack
And to take a more holistic approach to your health, my new book is all about the importance of choosing foods with nutrition that your body can actually absorb and utilize. Learn more and order your copy here.