Comparison of Therapeutic Effects of Linagliptin and Metformin in Patients with Type 2 Diabetes: A systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

Type 2 diabetes mellitus (DM) is a metabolic disorder that is common throughout the world. Meta-analysis is a statistical technique in which the results of two or more independent studies, with similar objectives, are mathematically combined in order to improve the reliability of the results. The aim of this study was to compare the efficacy of metformin and linagliptin in patients with type 2 diabetes.
To identify relevant studies, PubMed, ISI Web of Science, Embase, Cochran library, Scopus and Ovid databases were searched from January 2000 to August 2016. Mean difference (MD) with 95% confidence interval (CI) for efficacy were calculated and pooled analysis was performed using Stata V.12 and RevMan V.5.3 software.
Four studies recruiting1260 patients with DM (682 patients in group linagliptin and 578 patients in metformin group) were included in this study. The MD of HbA1C outcome of 0.5 mg linagliptin was effective (0. 7295, % CI = 0. 69 - 0. 75). The MD of fasting blood sugar (FBS) test revealed that linagliptin was effective at 0.5mg (MD = 36.79, 95% CI = 35.20 - 38.38) and 5 mg (MD = 12.65, 95% CI = 2.68 to 22.63) doses.
Our results suggest that some doses of linagliptin versus metformin may be an effective treatment for DM2. However, the number of studies was limited, and further research is needed.