Information about your Diabetes medication  - update April 2023

You are currently being prescribed a “flozin” medication to help treat your diabetes. “Flozins” include medications called empagliflozin, canagliflozin and dapagliflozin  (also known as Jardiance ®, Invokana ® and Forxiga ®).

These are effective medicines for treating type 2 diabetes. They help control your blood glucose (sugar) levels and can also help to reduce your weight and blood pressure. They can also help prevent heart disease, and reduce your risk of cardiovascular complications, if you have type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease.

With all treatments, benefits are balanced with potential side effects.

Very common side effects include low blood sugar and dehydration.

Common side effects can also include urinary tract infections and genital yeast infections (thrush). This is due to the mechanism of the medication as it increases the amount of glucose in the urine.

There is also a very rare but important side effect leading to severe infection of the perineum. This is also called “necrotising fasciitis” or “Fournier’s gangrene”. This is a serious soft tissue infection of the genitals or the area between the genitals and the anus.

• Please seek urgent medical advice if you develop a combination of symptoms of pain, tenderness, redness, or swelling of the genitals or te area between the genitals or the anus with fever or feeling generally unwell. These symptoms could be a sign of a rare but serious infection that has to be treated straight away.
• To help reduce the risk of this very rare complication you should pay particular attention to personal hygiene especially after passing urine.

Further information about “flozin” medication is available via the following link:

/media/content/files/Jardiance%20FAQ%20March%202023.pdf

Please arrange to speak to your diabetes nurse at the surgery if you have concerns about your medication or are experiencing side effects.

Yours sincerely

Carlisle Healthcare