Code Red: Combining two common drugs could GIVE YOU diabetes

Are you one of the hundreds of thousands of Americans in danger of seeing your blood sugar skyrocket simply because of the drugs your doctor’s prescribed?

If you take these two very common medications – pravastatin (sold as Pravachol) and paroxetine (sold as Paxil) – you could be facing a much greater risk of developing diabetes. And if you’re already struggling with diabetes, this combination could make it so much harder to manage. (The problem only occurs when these drugs are taken together – though both do come with their own long lists of negative side effects.)

Researchers have just found that taking these two specific drugs together can lead to extreme increases in blood sugar levels – even push you over the edge to developing full-blown diabetes. In fact, they found the average glucose increase was 19 mg/dl, enough to trigger diabetes. And in patients who were already diabetic, the pravastatin-paroxetine combination pushed glucose up by 48 mg/dl, a very dangerous jump.

If you are currently taking both of these drugs, talk to your doctor right away about switching at least one of them to protect yourself against the ravages of high blood sugar.