It started with a clinical hunch. Our colleagues in general practice noticed an apparent increase in cases of phimosis among patients with type 2 diabetes treated with SGLT2 inhibitors. Phimosis – what’s that again? It’s the inability to retract the foreskin. A condition in men that rarely gets attention and that is often related to infection and inflammation.

Intrigued, we dug into the data. PhD student Christine Ljungberg and colleagues conducted a study, recently published in Diabetes Care, and here’s what they found:

• A Danish cohort study of approx. 47,000 men with type 2 diabetes.
• Men initiating SGLT2 inhibitors had nearly twice the risk of phimosis compared with those starting GLP-1 receptor agonists, particularly in the first year. The elevated risk persisted up to 8 years.
• Although the absolute risk is low, these findings highlight the importance of clinician awareness and patient counseling, balancing the clear benefits of SGLT2 inhibitors with their potential urogenital harms.

This is a great example of how clinical observations can spark research that leads to new insights. We're grateful for the close collaboration with our colleagues in general practice and in the clinic. Translating data into meaningful improvements in patient care is exactly what drives us.

The results are published in Diabetes Care:

Ljungberg C, Nørgaard M, Vandenbroucke-Grauls C, Jakobsen JK, Charles MH, Pottegård A, Dalager-Pedersen M, Sørensen HT, Thomsen RW.
Risk of Phimosis Associated With SGLT2i Versus GLP-1RA: A Danish Cohort Study.
Diabetes Care. 2025 Jul 30:dc250693. doi: 10.2337/dc25-0693. Online ahead of print.