Sage Open Chronic DiseaseNov 15, 2026, 11:04 GMT

A diabetes drug class linked to fewer deaths after pneumonia

Among adults with type 2 diabetes hospitalized for pneumonia, 30-day mortality was 8.72% in users of the drugs versus 12.27% in nonusers.

Paper by Anne Chang, Tien-Chun Yang, Anna Chang, Chien-Tai Hong, Ying-Hsuan Tai · Shin Kong WHS Memorial Hospital · Taipei Medical University-Shuang Ho Hospital

Figure 1. Kaplan–Meier curves depicting event-free survival rates along with corresponding 95% confidence intervals.Kaplan–Meier curves depicting event-free survival rates along with corresponding 95% confidence intervals.Chang et al.

Our read

Populations

Studied:: Cohort study of 6,505 adults with type 2 diabetes hospitalized for pneumonia, against nonusers (Dose-response)
What changed:: Deaths were lower among drug users: 8.72% versus 12.27% in nonusers
The catch:: Differences in health or care between drug users and nonusers could explain lower mortality
In the record:: The 616th paper on SGLT2 inhibitors with results in people; 2,717 on record in all. Its result on mortality agrees with 199 of 221 other findings on record; 3 point the other way and 19 found no change.

Editor of record: Boris Djordjevic · AgingResearch.News

Paper

Adults with type 2 diabetes hospitalized for pneumonia were compared in an international retrospective propensity score-matched cohort study. Researchers matched patients with similar recorded characteristics, analyzing 6,505 patients from the TriNetX database. Hospitalizations occurred between January 2013 and March 2025. The comparison concerned prescriptions for sodium-glucose cotransporter-2 (SGLT2) inhibitors, a class of diabetes drugs, within 90 days before admission.

Users had lower mortality within 30 days than nonusers. They also had fewer serious respiratory events and cases of acute kidney injury. Diabetic ketoacidosis, a dangerous buildup of acids in the blood, occurred in 0.25% of users versus 0.46% of nonusers. Longer use was associated with lower rates of death, serious respiratory events and acute kidney injury.

Why it matters

Pneumonia outcomes matter to healthy aging for people living with type 2 diabetes. The authors call for randomized trials to test whether the drugs themselves improve those outcomes.

Caveats

Matching could not rule out differences in health or care between people prescribed these drugs and nonusers. The findings concern adults with type 2 diabetes hospitalized for pneumonia, not people without diabetes.