A healthy diet and exercise tend to be healthy for weight loss, but sometimes you need the extra boost to get you on the right path to a healthy weight. A drug just approved by the FDA is making headlines for that reason, after research has shown that it is safer and more effective than many other weight loss drugs.
The Impartial Press reported Friday that Wegovy, a new weight loss drug, is likely to hit the consumer use market soon. This is after new company-funded research has shown that the injectable drug has been shown to help manage weight loss safely and get FDA approval. Wegovy is a higher dose of the diabetes medicine semaglutide, which has been shown to increase sugar metabolism.
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The AP reports that participants in the study who took Wegovy lost an average of 15% of body weight, or 34 pounds on average. Harold Bays, chief medical officer of the Obese Medical Association, who helped conduct Wegovy studies: “With existing drugs, you will get maybe 5% to 10% weight loss, sometimes not even that,” Bays said. Furthermore, participants saw their weight loss patterns maintained for an average of 14 months before the degree of weight loss decreased.
Another plus for Wegovy is that it is said to be safer than many drugs that have been developed to target obesity. The AP reports that the most common side effects from Wegovy were gastrointestinal problems, such as nausea, diarrhea and vomiting. “They usually dropped,” reports the AP, “but led to about 5% of study participants stopping taking it.” It is also said that in some cases a troidoid tumor, depression and pancreatitis developed. Wegovy “should not be taken by people with a personal or family history of certain thyroid and endocrine tumors,” according to the AP.
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