To help clarify the effectiveness, side effects and cost of weight loss drugs now available, Metabolism.com is providing this breakdown for consumers.
According to the CDC, the prevalence of obesity in the USA is ever-increasing and reached an all-time high of 42.4% of adults over the age of 20 in 2017 to 2018.
Despite the prevalence of obesity in the USA, only around 3% of sufferers take medication. Low uptake of obesity medication is partly due to patchy insurance coverage, as about 1/3rd of insurers don’t cover obesity drugs at all, including Medicare and Medicaid in around half of all states. (more…)
Al is a type 2 diabetic. He has learned a lot about how diet and exercise can influence his blood sugar but still has frustrations with treatment options. He shares his thoughts with metabolism.com:
I am a male 47 years of age. 2 years ago my A1C was at 9.9 i was eating horribly and not exercising. Now my diet consists of South beach diet phase 2 my A1C is now 6.5 and my sugars are between 80 to 130 . My exercise routine is every other day due to my weight I am 5′ 7 1/2 lbs and at 282lbs my back is killing me.
I understand that there needs to be a lot of testing for these things and rightly so. Ive noticed that there is some hazards with Byetta and am glad im not on that and on avandia. I must point out that with the problems diabetics already have we do not need to compound it with more even though I do wish the testings would some how be able to go faster and that more and more research is done with stem cell testing.
My next option is to go for bariatric surgery..but my insurance wont cover it.
So here i am at a catch 22 . I hope they come up with something soon.
I am a male 47 years of age. 2 years ago my A1C was at 9.9 i was eating horribly and not exercising. Now my diet consists of South beach diet phase 2 my A1C is now 6.5 and my sugars are between 80 to 130 . My exercise routine is every other day due to my weight I am 5′ 7 1/2 lbs and at 282lbs my back is killing me.
I understand that there needs to be a lot of testing for these things and rightly so. Ive noticed that there is some hazards with Byetta and am glad im not on that and on avandia. I must point out that with the problems diabetics already have we do not need to compound it with more even though I do wish the testings would some how be able to go faster and that more and more research is done with stem cell testing.
My next option is to go for bariatric surgery..but my insurance wont cover it.
So here i am at a catch 22 . I hope they come up with something soon.
The mission of the The Thyroid Project is to encourage sharing of information and experience between the public and the medical community about the treatment of hypothyroidism (low thyroid function). For at least the past few decades there is a growing awareness of “something missing†in the way suffers of hypothyroidism are treated for their disease.
Too many patients, as documented in an on-line study of 12,000 individuals conducted by the American Thyroid Association published in June 2018, (https://doi.org/10.1089/thy.2017.0681) , complain of persistent symptoms of hypothyroidism despite what their doctors believe is successful treatment with levothyroxine (brands include Synthroid, Unithroid, Tirosent, Levoxl). We believe something needs to be done to resolve this conflict between patients and their doctors.
Without effective intervention the early stage of type 2 diabetes known as prediabetes carries a high risk of progressing to outright diabetes. Metabolism.com provides an up-to-date summary of recommendations from national authorities, for preventing and possibly reversing this life long affliction
Diabetes can be defined simply as elevated blood sugar levels. What exactly is high blood sugar and when should someone be concerned about their level? Does having prediabetes mean diabetes is around the corner? Metabolism.com tackles this tricky but important topic in this comprehensive review.
By Gary M. Pepper, M.D. Ozempic, Rybelsus, Trulicity, Wegovy, Saxenda are the central players in the weight loss craze sweeping across the globe. Metabolisim.com has been monitoring this phenomenon from its beginnings in 2008 with its report “Lizard Spit Reduces Blood Sugar and Appetite”, regarding the first drug in this class, Byetta (exenatide). Caught In the middle of the current chaos are the medical experts who treat diabetes and have been prescribing these medications for more than a decade. Here is a brief commentary from one such board certified endocrinologist; “I started treating Type 2 diabetics with GLP-1 agonists more than 10 years ago. In some respects, these medications have revolutionized the treatment of diabetes by lowering blood sugar effectively and promoting weight loss at the same time, a unique combination of benefits. Not everyone benefits from these drugs to the same degree unfortunately, and I have seen lots of patients experience unacceptable side effects from them. Nothing though, has prepared me for what is happening now. Too often, I find myself confronting someone who expects me to prescribe one of these drugs just so they can lose weight. Sadly, one extreme example was someone who, despite battling a life threatening medical condition, was insistent on getting a prescription. At the same time my diabetic patients are scrambling to find a place to buy their medications if they can even afford it. It is disheartening, to say the least, and I dread the negative interactions with some of my patients I now face almost daily.”
Off- Label Use
The FDA is the U.S. government’s department tasked with evaluating and approving drugs for specific medical conditions. When a new medication is approved for treating a medical condition by the FDA the agency will, at the same time, set strict guidelines for exactly which patients may use the newly approved drug. When a medication is used “off-label” it means that these limitations are being overridden by the provider for a potential benefit which outweighs the drugs risks. It is a general misconception that off-label means illegal; it does not. This practice has been going on for ages and more than 20% of prescriptions in the United States are prescribed off-label. A common example is the use of beta-blockers (approved for heart problems) for the treatment of performance anxiety.
GLP-1 agonist drugs, as discussed recently by metabolism.com. were originally approved for the treatment of Type 2 diabetes in adults. In the past few years most of these same medications have gained unprecedented popularity for their “off-label” weight loss benefit. Of the 5 GLP-1 agents presently in U.S. pharmacies only Wegovy (semaglutide) and Saxenda (liraglutide) are FDA approved for treating obesity. Of these two, Wegovy is the newer and had been much more popular that its sister drug Saxenda, probably due to being dosed only once weekly compared to daily for Saxenda and less likely to cause side effects. Due to Wegovy’s soaring popularity, its manufacturer, Novo Nordisk, increased the price of Wegovy two times since its initial release.
