Background: Several studies have evaluated the effects of coenzyme Q10 on glycemic control, but there are large discrepancies between studies.

Objective: This meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials aimed to summarize the effect of Co-Q10 on diabetes’ biomarkers.

Methods: This systematic review and meta-analysis was conducted on studies published from 1998 until December 2015. We searched Pub med, EMBASE, Science direct, ISI web of science and Google Scholar to find relevant studies. Totally, our search resulted in 16 articles reporting the effects of Co-Q10 on fasting blood glucose, fasting insulin and HbA1c. Mean ± standard deviations (SD) were used for calculating mean differences. 95% confidence interval was considered between intervention and control treatments.

Results: The present meta-analysis revealed that Co-Q10 decreased fasting blood glucose (-0.20mg/dl, 95%: -0.38,-0.02). However, Co-Q10 supplementation could not effectively reduce HbA1c (0.05%; 95%: -0.22, 0.12) and fasting insulin (0.12pmol/l; 95%: -0.21, 0.44).

Conclusion: Co-Q10supplementation didn’t result in reduction in HbA1c and fasting insulin. However, it had a significant lowering effect on fasting blood glucose. It should be noted that significant changes in fasting blood glucose reported in this study was due to the extended sample size and this is not clinically significant in the present study.