Diabetes Drug Halts Weight Gain in Kids Taking Antipsychotics

Metformin may allow children to stay healthy mentally and physically, study finds.

By Serena Gordon
HealthDay Reporter
Friday, December 1, 2006; 12:00 AM

Copyright © 2006 ScoutNews LLC. All rights reserved.

FRIDAY, Dec. 1 (HealthDay News) -- While increasing numbers of children and teens are being treated for psychiatric illness with medications called atypical antipsychotics, many experience significant weight gain while on these drugs -- as much as a pound or more a week.

However, a new study suggests that the diabetes drug metformin may be able to put the brakes on that weight gain.

During the 16-week study period, children taking metformin along with atypical antipsychotics lost a slight amount of weight, while those given a placebo along with their psychiatric medications gained nearly 9 pounds.

"For someone with a major psychiatric diagnosis, there's a stigma attached to that to begin with, then if you add obesity on top of that, there's an additional stigma," noted the study's lead author, Dr. David Klein, an endocrinologist at Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center. "Now, if people do gain weight, there's an effective treatment to control weight gain."

Results of the study are in the December 2006 issue of the American Journal of Psychiatry.

Atypical antipsychotic medications include risperidone (brand name Risperidal), olanzapine (brand name Zyprexa) and quetiapine (brand name Seroquel). These medications are used to treat a variety of psychiatric illnesses, such as bipolar disorder and schizophrenia.

Increased appetite and accompanying weight gain are common side effects attributed to the drugs.

"We know that appetite increases, but the mechanism behind that isn't fully clear," said Dr. Glenn Hirsch, medical director of the New York University Child Study Center.

Klein said his interest was piqued when he saw a patient with type 2 diabetes who was "eating voraciously." Once he took her off the antipsychotic medications, her diabetes went away. Unfortunately, her psychiatric symptoms quickly returned. Once back on the atypical antipsychotics, her diabetes came back.

That suggested, said Klein, "that there was some 'diabeticogenic' effect of these agents," and that insulin resistance might play some role in the excess weight gain.