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The Best Weight Loss Drug Semaglutide 2.4 - Medical Minute #34

The Best Weight Loss Drug Semaglutide 2.4

Hi, welcome. I’m Dr. Craig Primack, and I’m really excited today to bring you another medical minute. Today’s medical minute is about a new weight loss drug that will at some point be coming to the market, Semaglutide or SEMA 2.4. I’m just going to call it SEMA 2.4 until we have a new name.

What is Semaglutide?

So what is Semaglutide? Semaglutide is a hormone, which is related to GLP-1. We all have GLP-1. In each of us, it lasts for about two minutes. So it’s a hormone as food comes through our intestine and starts getting digested in the small intestine, the body sends this hormone through the blood to the brain and says I’m full. In you and I, the natural half-life is about two minutes, so the body has to keep sending more. As the food goes through, the signal stops and we get hungry again. It makes a lot of sense.

Well, Semaglutide at 2.4 milligrams is an artificial form that lasts one week. It’s related to a drug or two that are already on the market. Semaglutide does come in doses up to one milligram currently, and there is also an oral form available.

The Weight Loss Study

So, in the New England Journal of Medicine, February 10th, 2021, there was an article published and it talked about Semaglutide. So in this study, about 1900 or a little over 1900 patients, they either had to have a body mass index greater than 30 or a body mass index in their greater than 27 with a couple of, we’ll call it, weight related risk factors, high blood pressure, dyslipidemia, which is abnormal cholesterol, sleep apnea or heart disease. And they were put into two groups. One that was on Semaglutide as well as diet and counseling or the other that was on placebo.

This study went on for 68 weeks. It gave it some time for them to get up to full doses or at least close to full doses of Semaglutide. On average, what we found is people on Semaglutide 2.4, SEMA 2.4, lost 14.9% of their weight, 14.9% of their weight. That is as good as many people who undergo weight loss surgery, whether it be the sleeve or the Roux-en-Y procedure a couple years in.

Not only was the overall average high, but the

amount of people that lost 5% or more weight was 86% of the population. The amount of the people in this study who lost

10% or more of their weight was 70%.

So seven out of 10 people lost 10% or more of their weight. 15% or more of their weight was 50%,

and about a third of the people lost 20% or more of their weight. That’s where we’re getting close to bariatric surgery.

Semaglutide for Weight Loss is Coming Soon

So this as a drug is not out today, but it will be out soon. I’m hoping sometime this year. Until then, what we need to do is continue to use medicines like Semaglutide smaller dose form for diabetes and pre-diabetes, and we are seeing amazing results even in the lower doses. We use other medications with or without those in certain people who have struggled so far with their weight and are just tired of fighting the weight battle again.

We do use diets, as well as just reducing calories and using meal replacements, which we found to be some of the most aggressive diets that people can keep up for a long time. Gentle exercise and a class series that we put together. Put all that together, we get what we would call a comprehensive successful program. Thank you for being here today. I am really excited to talk to you about Semaglutide 2.4. I’m really excited sometime this year for all of us when it becomes a drug available as another tool in our armamentarium.

Check back with me on a regular basis. As soon as I hear more about it, I will be letting all of you know.

Thanks, and I hope to talk to you again soon. Bye-bye.

 

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