Cardiovascular effects of antidiabetic drugs

Type 2 diabetes mellitus is a common and severe chronic metabolic disease, which confers increased risk of cardiovascular disease and mortality. During the last decade a large number of new drugs within the classes dipeptidyl peptidase 4 (DPP-4) inhibitors (DPP-4Is), glucagon-like peptide 1 (GLP-1) receptor agonists (GLP-1RAs) and sodium/glucose cotransporter 2 (SGLT-2) inhibitors (SGLT-2Is) have been developed and tested in nine large-scale cardiovascular outcome trials (CVOTs). Here we review the evidence behind antihyperglycemic treatment of patients with type 2 diabetes with a particular focus on compiling and summarizing the evidence of hard clinical endpoints stemming from these large CVOTs.