ArticlePharmaceuticals (Basel, Switzerland)2023
The Risk of Age-Related Macular Degeneration Is Reduced in Type 2 Diabetes Patients Who Use Metformin.
Article in Pharmaceuticals (Basel, Switzerland), 2023. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 7 papers.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
7 citing papers in PubMed, 11 citations in OpenAlex.
- From Diabetes to Degenerative Diseases: The Multifaceted Action of Metformin.International journal of molecular sciences · 2025Review
- Dose-Dependent Relationship Between Long-Term Metformin Use and the Risk of Diabetic Retinopathy: A Population-Based Cohort Study.Clinical drug investigation · 2025Article
- Association between the weight-adjusted waist index and age-related macular degeneration in US adults aged≥40 years: the NHANES 2005-2008.Frontiers in medicine · 2025Article
- Association between sodium-glucose cotransporter-2 (SGLT2) inhibitors and macular degeneration in patients with diabetes: a nationwide population-based study in Taiwan.Acta diabetologica · 2024Article
- The association of inflammatory biomarkers with clinical outcomes in diabetic retinopathy participants: data from NHANES 2009-2018.Diabetology & metabolic syndrome · 2024Article
- Revolutionary drug repositioning: the preventive and therapeutic potential of metformin and other antidiabetic drugs in age-related macular degeneration.Frontiers in pharmacology · 2024Article
- Potential Efficacy of Metformin for Age-Related Macular Degeneration: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.Ophthalmology scienceArticle
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
1 author at 1 institution in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
backgroundWhether metformin may reduce the risk of age-related macular degeneration (AMD) requires confirmation. This study compared the risk of AMD between ever users and never users of metformin matched on propensity score (PS) in Taiwanese patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus.
methodsWe enrolled study subjects from Taiwan's National Health Insurance. A total of 423,949 patients with new onset diabetes from 1999 to 2005 were identified. After excluding ineligible patients and enrolling only patients aged between 50 and 79 years, we created 13,303 pairs of ever users and never users of metformin matched on PS. The patients were followed from 1 January 2006 to 31 December 2011. We estimated hazard ratios by Cox regression.
resultsAMD was newly diagnosed in 506 ever users and 639 never users. The respective incidence rates (per 100,000 person-years) were 778.72 and 1016.62. The hazard ratio (HR) and 95% confidence interval (CI) for ever versus never users was 0.756 (0.673-0.850). While ever users were categorized by tertiles of cumulative duration (<31.8, 31.8-63.9 and >63.9 months) and cumulative dose (<947.1, 947.1-2193.5 and >2193.5 g) of metformin, a dose-response pattern was observed. For the respective tertiles of cumulative duration, the HRs (95% CIs) were 1.131 (0.961-1.330), 0.821 (0.697-0.967) and 0.464 (0.384-0.561), while compared to never users. For the respective tertiles of cumulative dose, the HRs (95% CIs) were 1.131 (0.962-1.329), 0.739 (0.624-0.876) and 0.525 (0.438-0.629). A risk reduction among ever users was observed for all tertiles of defined daily dose but was most remarkable for the third tertile with a defined daily dose of >0.64. Subgroup analyses suggested that the benefit of metformin could be similarly observed among men and women and for age subgroups of 50-64 and 65-79 years. However, patients with diabetic retinopathy would not be significantly benefited and metformin did not seem to be preventive for exudative AMD.
conclusionIn general, metformin significantly reduces the risk of AMD.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What Socratic holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the Socratic graph.