A doctor has spoken about a rule she has when it comes to making decisions on her health as she discussed the impacts of Ozempic.
There are plenty of weight loss drugs on the market which work by telling your brain you're full so you won't eat as much, with the idea that it'll significantly lower your calorific intake and cause you to lose weight.
However, it's not as simple as jabbing yourself thinner, as there are plenty of other health impacts of these drugs.
Some people taking the likes of Ozempic, Wegovy, Mounjaro and others have noticed side effects, especially on their digestive systems, and the simulations aren't particularly pretty.
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Speaking about the impact of drugs like Ozempic, Dr Mindy Pelz appeared on the Diary of a CEO podcast to say how the drug had some 'amazing upsides' and warned not to 'totally villainise it', but that with every health decision she wanted to keep her '100-year-old' rule in mind.
The doctor said it could be a 'lifeline' for people going through a 'massive metabolic crisis', but hammered home the point that there was no easy ticket to a healthy life and the real key was your lifestyle itself.
"In the end you are going to have to make health your responsibility, and you're going to have to work for it, especially as you age," Dr Pelz pointed out.
"One of my guiding principles that I always think about is my 100-year-old self. Am I doing today something that would make my 100-year-old self proud?
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"Am I living a life every single day, I'm 54 years old, that is going to make me a happier, healthier human at 70, 80, 90?
"I have my future self always in the forefront of my mind in everything that I do."
There's plenty of research into exactly what these drugs do to us and what else they might be doing besides telling our brains we're full and don't need to eat any more.
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Another doctor warned that in addition to losing weight through shedding fat, you could also lose muscle mass too, which has been causing some of the more visible side effects, such as 'Ozempic face'.
Dr Boz warned that people on these drugs who shed a lot of muscle mass 'cannot gain it back without extreme measures', and just because you're losing weight, it doesn't mean you shouldn't be paying attention to your exercise and nutrition.
Novo Nordisk, Ozempic's manufacturer, told LADbible Group: "Wegovy®▼ (semaglutide injection) and Ozempic® (semaglutide injection) are prescription-only medicines and require a healthcare professional to prescribe under strict supervision. Treatment decisions should be made together with a healthcare provider who can evaluate the appropriateness of using a GLP-1 based on assessment of a patient’s individual medical profile.
"Patient safety is of the utmost importance to Novo Nordisk. We continuously collect safety data on our marketed GLP-1 RA medicines and work closely with the authorities to ensure patient safety. As part of this work we continue to monitor reports of adverse drug reactions through routine pharmacovigilance. Regarding safety, the most common adverse events among people treated with Ozempic® (semaglutide injection) for its indicated use, are gastrointestinal events including nausea, diarrhoea and vomiting. Most events were transient, and mild or moderate in severity and resolved without permanent treatment discontinuation.
"We recommend that any patients experiencing side effects while taking GLP receptor agonists including Wegovy® or Ozempic® report them to their healthcare provider and via the MHRA Yellow Card scheme: https://yellowcard.mhra.gov.uk/."
Joe Harker