Can pharmaceutical care decrease the oxidative stress in type 2 diabetes mellitus?

Type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2D) is a chronic metabolic disorder characterized by an increase in oxidative stress, which is itself related to development of T2D's main chronic complications. Oxidative stress caused by elevated production of reactive species of oxygen and decrease of antioxidant defense system level, leads to activation of lipid peroxidation (LPO) and oxidative lipoprotein modification with increasing atherogenicity. Therefore, the aim of this study was to evaluate whether pharmacotherapeutic follow-up in patients with T2D, users and non-users of insulin, interferes with the levels of oxidative stress, measuring lipid peroxidation and protein oxidation, nitric oxide and superoxide dismutase levels. After the follow-up, there was a decrease in nitric oxide levels and an increase in superoxide dismutase concentration for the group with insulin therapy. Accordingly, these results show that the proposed pharmaceutical care program reduced the oxidative stress levels, mainly in patients in insulin therapy, as a consequence, can impact in the surging of the main chronic complications in T2D.

Pharmaceutical care improves medication adherence and quality of life in type 2 diabetes mellitus

Aims: This study aimed to evaluate whether pharmacotherapeutic follow-up in patients with T2DM in primary care interferes in metabolic control, cardiovascular risk, medication adherence and quality of life. Methods: A prospective clinical study was conducted at two Primary Health Units in Vitória, Espírito Santo, Brazil with 75 patients with T2DM between 40 and 70 years old. The parameters of metabolic control evaluated included fasting blood glucose, HbA1c, triglyceride/HDL-c and total cholesterol/HDL-c ratio. The cardiovascular risk was calculated based on the Framingham risk score. Adherence to medication was measured using the Brief Medication Questionnaire and quality of life was evaluated by applying the World Health Organization Quality of Life-Bref. Results: After the follow-up, there was a significant decreasing in cardiovascular risk (p=0.048) and total cholesterol/HDL-c ratio (p=0.024) and a discrete improvement in fast glucose and HbA1c levels. The quality of life scores increased for all domains (p<0.0001) and the treatment adherence also improved with 12.00% of the patients classified as low adherence in the final time, against 41.33% before the meetings. Conclusion: These results show the proposed pharmacotherapeutic follow-up influenced positively cardiovascular risk, adherence to therapy and quality of life in all domains, and, therefore, may contribute to delay the onset of the main chronic complications of the disease (AU)