Patients with heart failure who don’t have diabetes benefit from being prescribed dapagliflozin as much as those with the disease, suggests a ground-breaking study.

Results from the DAPA-HF (Dapagliflozin and Prevention of Adverse Outcomes in Heart Failure) trial add to a growing body of evidence that SGLT2 inhibitors can be used outside the glucose-lowering setting.

The Scottish-led research randomly assigned 4700 patients (mean age 66) with heart failure and an ejection fraction below 40% to either 10mg once-daily dapagliflozin or placebo, in addition to recommended usual therapy.

Notably, only 42% had a history of type 2 diabetes at baseline, whereas previous SGLT2 inhibitor cardioprotective trials had specifically recruited patients with diabetes.