Metformin and Aging

[whm2074]

So I recently started a subscription to National Geographic and read an article about slowing down aging. The article mention the the anti-diabetic medication Metformin may increase healthy lifespan in those who do have type 2 diabetes. But even with Type-2, lifestyle changes such as diet and exercise are required. Here is another article I found(long read):

A Critical Review of the Evidence That Metformin Is a Putative Anti-Aging Drug That Enhances Healthspan and Extends Lifespan

The numerous beneficial health outcomes associated with the use of metformin to treat patients with type 2 diabetes (T2DM), together with data from pre-clinical studies in animals including the nematode, C. elegans, and mice have prompted investigations ...

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

Of course more research is needed and they are some side effects when first taking it.

 

[whm2074]

Here is the National Geographic article I read for those of you who have a subscription (Long read):
https://www.nationalgeographic.com/magazine/article/aging-cure-longevity-science-technology-feature

Note: I take Metformin for type 2 diabetes.

 

[papadage]

I take it also. My brothers, who are both younger than I am tell me I don’t age. I am 55 and if I keep my beard clipped short, don’t look it at all.

I also read about its protective effects for Internal organs. As a diabetic, COVID worries me, but doctors are saying that people on Metformin have fewer long Covid issues and much less organ failure.

 

[whm2074]

I take it also. My brothers, who are both younger than I am tell me I don’t age. I am 55 and if I keep my beard clipped short, don’t look it at all.

I also read about its protective effects for Internal organs. As a diabetic, COVID worries me, but doctors are saying that people on Metformin have fewer long Covid issues and much less organ failure.

So I'm not the only who looks younger then I am. Every time i shave and get a haircut folks tell I look like I'm in my 30's, and I'm 49.

 

[papadage]

I am 55 and look younger than almost everyone I went to school with. Except the black guys. Those guys look YOUNG!

 

[Shavano]

If metformin has benefits for people who aren't diabetic, will we start to see it available for people without that condition?

 

[whm2074]

If metformin has benefits for people who aren't diabetic, will we start to see it available for people without that condition?

I don't think the FDA will allow that since they don't consider Aging to be a disease. But it prescribe for those who are pre-diabetic. But here's the thing: A healthy diet and exercise are needed as well.

 

[Auguste_Fivaz]

I've been on methotrexate to treat rheumatoid arthritis for about 20 years. I deeply want to stop taking it, but my Rheumy's say it will increase my chance of heart disease if I do. I knew this was one of the good things MTX does, keeping the heart healthy, and discovered it just after I started taking it. The downsides to using the drug are why I'd like to quit.
My story is on topic for two reasons, 1) you just don't know what these drugs will do to you other than the target reason given for your use and 2) can you stop taking it without killing yourself?
The fears of complications in pancreatic function for Olzimpic are sometimes mentioned in discussing the use of that drug for weighloss, but not often enough. Does Metformin contain a potential harm if used with a healthy pancreas?

 

[whm2074]

The fears of complications in pancreatic function for Olzimpic are sometimes mentioned in discussing the use of that drug for weighloss, but not often enough. Does Metformin contain a potential harm if used with a healthy pancreas?

Good question. But I think Metformin protects the pancreas from farther damage from type 2 diabetes.

 

[Piblokto]

I’m taking metformin, though I’m pretty healthy and not diabetic or pre-. I take it strictly for the possible “anti-aging” benefits. Don’t know if it’s working for that, but since it is an old, generic, cheap, and pretty well understood drug, with a good safety profile, and because my primary care physician immediately agreed to prescribe it (off-label) when I asked for her thoughts, I don’t see much downside risk. The most common adverse event is lower GI problems (e.g., diarrhea), but I didn’t experience that.

 

[teleos]

I’m taking metformin, though I’m pretty healthy and not diabetic or pre-. I take it strictly for the possible “anti-aging” benefits. Don’t know if it’s working for that, but since it is an old, generic, cheap, and pretty well understood drug, with a good safety profile, and because my primary care physician immediately agreed to prescribe it (off-label) when I asked for her thoughts, I don’t see much downside risk. The most common adverse event is lower GI problems (e.g., diarrhea), but I didn’t experience that.

That's a very sensible take on metformin today. There is a lot of research on the potential benefits of metformin, but to me they don't seem conclusive yet. Still a better chance of being useful than NMN.

 

[whm2074]

The most common adverse event is lower GI problems (e.g., diarrhea), but I didn’t experience that.

I experience diarrhea when I first started taking Metformin, but not any in years.

 

[Shavano]

I’m taking metformin, though I’m pretty healthy and not diabetic or pre-. I take it strictly for the possible “anti-aging” benefits. Don’t know if it’s working for that, but since it is an old, generic, cheap, and pretty well understood drug, with a good safety profile, and because my primary care physician immediately agreed to prescribe it (off-label) when I asked for her thoughts, I don’t see much downside risk. The most common adverse event is lower GI problems (e.g., diarrhea), but I didn’t experience that.

Most common is almost never the most serious with drug side effects and interactions. So those aren't the ones you need to worry about. The most serious is lactic acidosis, which is rare but often fatal when it occurs. But there's little information on webmd about the dose at which that becomes a risk.

 

[LizandreBZH]

There is this miracle drug every 4-5 years, anti aging and all that. A lot of hype and then poof, the fad disappears. Taking drugs without a objective medical need is always a risk.

 

[whm2074]

There is this miracle drug every 4-5 years, anti aging and all that. A lot of hype and then poof, the fad disappears. Taking drugs without a objective medical need is always a risk.

Well it seems that Metformin has been out long enough in the US, that the risks are well known. But you are right, shouldn't any meds that we don't need or benefit from.

 

[demultiplexer]

You'd be surprised. Some of the most common drugs in the world like tylenol don't have well-controlled studies in children, pregnant people and the elderly. There's a fair bit of ethical issues even doing studies like that, but beyond that - medicine is often thought of as this methodical, super-strict process of finding things that are effective and safe, but it's much more nuanced.

That's not to say that a lot of medicine is ineffective and/or unsafe, just that there are a lot of types of effects and effect sizes that you just can't know about until you have literally decades of data on tens of thousands of people.

Likewise, if the effect of metformin on aging were big enough to come out of early effectiveness or safety studies, you can bet your sweet ass that it'd have been capitalized on well before its release even. Its effect cannot be that big. If it's there, it is going to be in the order of the smallest of effects listed on the label.

 

[Peldor]

Speaking of Tylenol, I've heard several people argue the liver toxicity of acetaminophen would likely keep it from being approved as a new drug.

Acetaminophen Toxicity - StatPearls - NCBI Bookshelf

 

[Piblokto]

Most common is almost never the most serious with drug side effects and interactions. So those aren't the ones you need to worry about. The most serious is lactic acidosis, which is rare but often fatal when it occurs. But there's little information on webmd about the dose at which that becomes a risk.

Agree and disagree. No one should take any drug without careful thought, and you have to take the most serious AEs into account. But the most serious AEs can also be very rare (as is lactic acidosis with metformin use), or mostly seen in patients with other significant disease (chronic kidney disease in this context), while some common AEs can be very bothersome (diarrhea with metformin use prompts a lot of discontinuation).

Likewise, if the effect of metformin on aging were big enough to come out of early effectiveness or safety studies, you can bet your sweet ass that it'd have been capitalized on well before its release even. Its effect cannot be that big. If it's there, it is going to be in the order of the smallest of effects listed on the label.

Maybe. Though there are at least two serious studies aimed at this, it will be always be very difficult in a clinical trial to definitively establish an anti-aging benefit. So I wouldn’t expect there’s much to see in this regard from earlier shorter-term studies, and I’m not holding my breath for even a small effect to be clearly shown in these later studies.

 

[rain shadow]

I briefly took metformin metoprolol for high BP quite a while back and it was a personal disaster. I was angry at everyone, had no energy, actually came close to a remarkably out of character violent outburst, I planned a homicide (although I definitely did not act on it!), lost my job, and was unemployed for 18 months. It was a terrible experience at all levels, one of the worst of my entire life. There was nothing else going on in my life that was stressful or even unpleasant, no other medications involved, and all of the problems just faded away a couple days after I stopped taking it so the cause and effect is very clear in my mind. I feel quite bad for everyone who had to put up with me, although I believe I managed to keep most of the really dark stuff inside.

I don't know how other people can take metformin metoprolol and not completely lose it.

My speculation is that it slowed everything down so much that some bodily activities fell below a maintenance level and various feedback loops started either shutting down or going hypercritical, in a way that set off the flight-or-fight response 24/7 for multiple months. I diligently researched the topic once my head cleared up and there just wasn't anything out there describing what happened to me. Possibly my doc just overdosed me based on a BP to milligrams formula provided by the manufacturer. I guess I am content to never really know what happened, as long as it doesn't recur.

EDIT: Just because two totally unrelated medications start with the same three letters does not mean they are the same thing!!! While my experience was accurately portrayed it is not relevant to the actual topic of this thread, metformin.

 

[Arbelac]

I briefly took metformin for high BP quite a while back and it was a personal disaster. I was angry at everyone, had no energy, actually came close to a remarkably out of character violent outburst, I planned a homicide (although I definitely did not act on it!), lost my job, and was unemployed for 18 months. It was a terrible experience at all levels, one of the worst of my entire life. There was nothing else going on in my life that was stressful or even unpleasant, no other medications involved, and all of the problems just faded away a couple days after I stopped taking it so the cause and effect is very clear in my mind. I feel quite bad for everyone who had to put up with me, although I believe I managed to keep most of the really dark stuff inside.

I don't know how other people can take metformin and not completely lose it.

My speculation is that it slowed everything down so much that some bodily activities fell below a maintenance level and various feedback loops started either shutting down or going hypercritical, in a way that set off the flight-or-fight response 24/7 for multiple months. I diligently researched the topic once my head cleared up and there just wasn't anything out there describing what happened to me. Possibly my doc just overdosed me based on a BP to milligrams formula provided by the manufacturer. I guess I am content to never really know what happened, as long as it doesn't recur.

Drug interactions can be weird and unique. I remember being warned that a rare side effect of taking Accutane was clinical depression and suicidal ideation. The doc I was talking to said he had only had one patient that occurred in, but it could happen, and both effects went away after discontinuing treatment.

So your experience is totally believable, just likely extremely rare.

 

[Flipper35]

If metformin has benefits for people who aren't diabetic, will we start to see it available for people without that condition?

A friend of ours was prescribed Metformin as a fertility aid as she was having issues getting pregnant.

One thing to watch with Metformin is how hard it can be on your kidneys. A friend of the family dies due to compllications with kidney failure and my dad can no longer take it as it was ruining his kidneys. It isn't common, but it is not rare either. There are meds, like Lisinpril, that can help protect your kidneys, but that will lower your blood pressure. Not usually a problem with diabetics though. Mine has been below the limits for donating blood, which kinda sucks.

 

[whm2074]

I briefly took metformin for high BP quite a while back and it was a personal disaster. I was angry at everyone, had no energy, actually came close to a remarkably out of character violent outburst, I planned a homicide (although I definitely did not act on it!), lost my job, and was unemployed for 18 months. It was a terrible experience at all levels, one of the worst of my entire life. There was nothing else going on in my life that was stressful or even unpleasant, no other medications involved, and all of the problems just faded away a couple days after I stopped taking it so the cause and effect is very clear in my mind. I feel quite bad for everyone who had to put up with me, although I believe I managed to keep most of the really dark stuff inside.

I don't know how other people can take metformin and not completely lose it.

My speculation is that it slowed everything down so much that some bodily activities fell below a maintenance level and various feedback loops started either shutting down or going hypercritical, in a way that set off the flight-or-fight response 24/7 for multiple months. I diligently researched the topic once my head cleared up and there just wasn't anything out there describing what happened to me. Possibly my doc just overdosed me based on a BP to milligrams formula provided by the manufacturer. I guess I am content to never really know what happened, as long as it doesn't recur.

Metformin is given for type 2 diabetes and this the first I heard of anyone taking it for Blood Pressure.

 

[rain shadow]

I'm a retard. I have confused metformin with metoprolol. I apologize.