You can relax. As you noted,
Avandia
(rosiglitazone) has provided information to regulatory authorities to allow a claim that it is useful to use with
sulfonylureas.
Glimepiride (brand name Amaryl, or in France, Amarel) is a sulfonylurea, and hence its use with rosiglitazone is appropriate. You can read
sulfonylureas
to find the names of many more sulfonylureas.
It should also be noted that some combinations of diabetes drugs have been studied by some manufacturers, and others have not been studied. For instance, if you read the US product label for Amaryl, you'll see that it's approved for use with metformin and with insulin, but not for use with the "glitazones" (rosiglitazone and
pioglitazone
(Actos)). But, at the same time, the maker of Avandia has developed a combination
product containing both Amaryl plus rosiglitazone in a single tablet, with the brand name Avandaryl.
The prescribing physician may choose to combine two (or more)
diabetes medications from different classes to help your diabetes control,
whether the manufacturer has provided sufficient data to regulatory
agencies to get approval for addition to their product's label,
or not, in which case the use is frequently described as "off-label".
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