Incidence of diabetes during antihypertensive treatment

A prospective population study of women in Gothenburg, Sweden, showed an increased risk of developing diabetes in women taking diuretics or beta-blockers as antihypertensive agents compared to other women. The risk seemed to be still higher, if the combination of diuretics and beta-blockers was used. The same observation was made also when the study was confined to hypertensive women indicating that not only the hypertensive state but also the antihypertensive drugs per se may be a risk factor for developing diabetes. This possibility is further strengthened by the fact that, as far as diabetes type II is concerned, the hypertensive state in most cases precedes the development of diabetes, while only few subjects with diabetes type II develop arterial hypertension. We could only study the possible diabetic effect of diuretics and beta-blockers. It must, however, be of great interest to study alpha-blockers, calcium antagonists and ACE inhibitors in the same way. If one or more of these new substances will prove not to be diabetogenic, this will be a very important factor in our choice of first drug in the treatment of arterial hypertension.