Introduction: At present, diabetes mellitus (DM) is considered one of the main problems after cardiovascular and oncological diseases. The possibilities of modern diagnostics and treatment of diabetes mellitus have been significantly expanded, which makes it possible to reduce mortality and significantly increase the life expectancy of patients. However, there has been a significant increase in mortality from multiple complications of diabetes. Therefore, clinicians in different countries have focused on the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of complications of diabetes, including lesions of the hepatobiliary system (HBS). Ursodeoxycholic acid was chosen as a drug for the treatment of HBS, which has choleretic, cholelitholytic, hypolipidemic, hypocholesterolemic effects.

Aim: To assess some clinical and laboratory parameters of patients with diabetes mellitus after a course of ursodeoxycholic acid treatment.

Materials and methods: The study included 30 patients with type 1 diabetes and 48 patients with type 2 diabetes. The control group consisted of 23 practically healthy people. The course of treatment was 6 months. The drug was used at the rate of 10-12 mg per 1 kg of body per day. Clinical and laboratory (assessment of clinical signs, general and biochemical blood tests) research methods were used.

Results: After a 6-month course of treatment, 64 (82.1%) patients reported a significant improvement in their condition – in the form of a decrease in weakness, fatigue, a decrease in dyspeptic complaints, an increase in working capacity (p<0.05). It was found that compared with the indicators before treatment, all three indicators of cytolysis syndrome (ALT – from 0.92±0.08 to 0.66±0.05 mmol/hxL, AST – from 0.86±0, 01 to 0.57±0.04 mmol/hxL, LDG – from 346.0 ± 32.1 to 242.0±20.4 U/L) during treatment decreased 1.5 times (p<0.05). The same trend was observed in terms of glutamine transferase (from 58.2±4.5 to 34.3±5.2 U/L and ALP (from 146.2±8.8 to 96.5±7.5 U/L When comparing lipid metabolism parameters before and after treatment, the levels of total cholesterol, LDL (from 4.9±1.2 to 3.2±0.2 mmol/L), HDL (from 0.84±0.16 to 1.1±0.4 mmol/L) and triglycerides (from 3.1±1.53 to 2.4±0.3 mmol/L), there was a tendency towards normalization of these indicators.

Conclusions: Thus, a six-month course of ursodeoxycholic acid treatment in patients with diabetes led to an improvement in the functional state of the hepatobiliary system, normalization of protein, pigment, enzymatic metabolism and, to a lesser extent, lipid metabolism in the liver, which indicates an improvement in cellular metabolism and redox processes.