Kidney damage is a constant danger for people with diabetes, especially when their blood pressure is high. Now European researchers report that the addition of a drug, spironolactone, to standard blood pressure-lowering therapy for such patients helps reduce both blood pressure and the amount of albumin protein in urine, a measure of kidney impairment, Reuters reports. Dr. Kaspar Rossing of Steno Diabetes Center in Gentofte, Denmark, and colleagues note in the medical journal Diabetes Care that two types of antihypertensive drugs -- ACE inhibitors and angiotensin receptor blockers (ARBs) -- have protective effects on the kidneys in diabetics who already have kidney damage. These drugs work by controlling the release of a hormone called aldosterone. While they're effective initially, aldosterone levels may subsequently rise once more in almost 40 percent of patients, resulting in greater urinary protein levels and a faster decline in kidney function. To see whether supplementary treatment with spironolactone, which is an aldosterone inhibitor, might be helpful in these circumstances, the researchers conducted a study with 21 patients with type 2 diabetes. --more 2230 Local Time 1930 GMT
