The American Diabetes Association’s Scientific Sessions were center stage this weekend in New Orleans. A few items of note: Stents and certain branded drugs were no better at preventing death in some diabetic patients than a regimen of older, cheaper drugs, according to a randomized, federally funded study of more than 2,000 patients, the WSJ reports . The study was constructed to answer several questions, largely related to cardiovascular health (diabetes raises the risk of cardiovascular problems such as heart attacks). Besides the stent question, the study found that for diabetics with severe heart disease, bypass surgery reduced the risk of death more than drug treatment alone. It also found that Avandia and Actos, made by GlaxoSmithKline and Takeda, respectively, didn’t reduce deaths more than insulin. (On the other hand, Actos and

Avandia are pills, which are easier to take than insulin, and they don’t carry insulin’s risk of causing dangerously low blood sugar.) A few small drug makers are seeing their stocks rise in pre-market trading after releasing promising data at the ADA conference, Dow Jones Newswires reports . Orexigen is up on data that showed its experimental drug Contrave improved eating control. Arena rose after researchers said a drug called lorcaserin helped patients lose weight and keep it off over a two-year period. And shares of Amylin and Alkermes were up on results that a once-a-week version of the diabetes drug Byetta helped patients control blood-glucose levels and lose weight. Image courtesy of Columbia University Medical Center

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Diabetes Roundup: Drugs, Stents and Stocks