Study shows metformin as effective as insulin injections during pregnancy

BOSTON According to a new study, metformin, the generic version of Bristol-Myers Squibb’s diabetes drug Glucophage, is just as effective as insulin injections in treating women who develop diabetes during pregnancy, researchers in New Zealand and Australia reported yesterday.

Gestational diabetes appears in 1-in-20 pregnant women, and there has been concern that metformin might affect a fetus because the drug can cross the placenta.

But the study, led by Janet Rowan of the Auckland City Hospital in New Zealand, found that the risk of complications such as respiratory distress, birth trauma and newborn hypoglycemia, or low blood sugar, was no different for the 363 women who received metformin and the 370 given conventional insulin shots.

After delivery, nearly 77 percent of the metformin recipients said they would want to stay with the pill if they developed diabetes during pregnancy again, even though 46 percent still needed supplemental insulin injections at some point. On the other hand, only 27 percent of those who got insulin shots felt the same way.

But doctors may still be cautious, the researchers said. “Clinicians may remain circumspect about using metformin until follow-up data for offspring are available,” they wrote. The children born during the study are being tested when they reach their second birthday.