The use of long-acting insulin analogues have been reported in patients with type 1 diabetes mellitus who exhibit important oscillations of their daily blood glucose, although the therapeutic benefits are lacking. The aim of this study was to evaluate the effectiveness and safety of the insulin analogue glargine compared detemir to support health decision-making.

We performed a systematic review with meta-analysis of observational studies (cohort and registry), available in the MEDLINE (Pubmed), Latin American and Caribbean Health Sciences (LILACS), EMBASE and Cochrane Library databases (accessed August 2017), including research in the electronic journal Diabetes Care and gray literature. Several combinations of terms were used, including disease terms, interventions and type of study. The results evaluated were: glycated hemoglobin; weight gain; occurrence of severe hypoglycemia; total insulin dose; and, fasting capillary glycemia. Methodological quality was assessed using the Newcastle scale. The meta-analyses were performed in Review Manager® 5.2 software using a random effects model. Protocol number CRD42017054925 (International Prospective Register of Ongoing Systematic Reviews).

A total of 705 publications, eight cohort studies were included. The quality of included studies was classified as high. In the meta-analysis, the results for episodes of severe hypoglycemia (p = 0.002), measurements of fasting capillary glycemia (p = 0.01), and weight gain (p = 0.001) were favorable for detemir. The glycated hemoglobin endpoint (p = 0.49, heterogeneity = 89 percent) revealed high heterogeneity and no statistically significant difference between groups, showing no difference between the interventions for glycemic control.

Although some results are favorable to detemir, it was not possible to identify significant differences in effectiveness and safety between the two analogues evaluated, requiring new long term studies and better quality of methodological studies.