Challenges of Sodium-glucose Transporter-2 Inhibitors Use in a low Socioeconomic Setting

Background: Sodium-glucose transporter-2 (SGLT2) inhibitors have shown efficacy in reducing major adverse cardiovascular events and hospitalizations for heart failure in patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus and concomitant heart failure. Aim: To compare the short-term effectiveness between empagliflozin and dapagliflozin. Methods: A single-center observational cohort study was implemented in a Dominican tertiary-care center, where patients with heart failure and reduced ejection fraction were divided into two groups and treated with different SGLT2 inhibitor molecules, empagliflozin and dapagliflozin. Two-step cluster analysis was conducted for the interim analysis of the study. Results: We enrolled a total of 60 patients, with a median age of 69. The majority of these were men (70%) and comprised 75.0% of the Dapagliflozin 10 mg group and 62.5% of the Empagliflozin 10 mg group. Most participants (61.7%) were categorized as NYHA-II in functional class. The main cause of heart failure was ischemic (55%), while the predominant state of the disease was chronic with 65% patients in this group. Conclusion: This preliminary manuscript evaluated the effectiveness of SGLT2 inhibitors in a Dominican heart failure patient cohort, finding notable gender, age, and risk factor variations, and emphasizing the need for standardized research methods in future investigations.