Unpacking the Risks of Wegovy, Ozempic, Mounjaro, and Zepbound
You know you’re ready to lose the weight and keep it off, but you’re not sure if weight loss medications are right for you. If you’re suffering from obesity, can second-generation weight loss medications like Mounjaro, Ozempic, Wegovy, and Zepbound help? And, perhaps even more importantly, are they safe? Are there safer and more efficacious alternatives to weight loss medications that can help you to lose the weight and keep it off?
In this blog post, we’ll walk through these questions together.
What Are the Risks of Weight Loss Drugs?
Second-generation weight-loss medications (Mounjaro, Ozempic, Wegovy, and Zepbound) represent substantial improvements over first-generation weight loss medications. The SURMOUNT-4 clinical trial of Tirzepatide (the active ingredient in Mounjaro and Zepbound) found that patients could lose up to 20.9% of their body weight. For a weight loss medication, this is impressive.
That said, there are concerns about the safety of these medications.
What are the problems with these new weight loss drugs? The SURMOUNT-4 trial found that fully 81% of patients reported at least one side effect. The most common weight loss drug side effects were nausea (35.5% of patients), diarrhea (21.1%), constipation (20.7%), and vomiting (16.3%). 7% of patients experienced such severe symptoms that they had to discontinue taking the medication, and 2% reported severe side effects.
A study of Semaglutide (the active ingredient in Ozempic and Wegovy) also found high rates of reported side effects. Almost half (48.6%) of patients experienced at least one side effect. Just like with Tirzepatide, nausea and diarrhea were the most common weight loss drug side effects; 36.6% of patients experienced nausea, and 8.6% of patients experienced diarrhea. 11.5% of patients in the trial experienced side effects that were severe enough that they had to either stop taking the medication or reduce their dose.
While the known risks of weight loss drugs are generally minor to moderate, patients are also at a higher risk of developing certain endocrine tumors in the pancreas or thyroid glands and possibly cancer, as well as pancreatitis and paralysis of the stomach.
For all four medications, a big concern is weight regain. The drugs are effective at helping many (though not all) patients to lose weight, but this weight loss often only lasts as long as the patient is taking the drug. When patients stop taking the medications, they often see substantial weight regain.
Safety Precautions For Mounjaro, Ozempic, Wegovy, and Zepbound
If you’re going to take weight loss medications, it is very important to do so only under medical supervision. A doctor can discuss potential side effects with you and discuss plans to deal with those side effects. A doctor will also screen you for conditions that may put you at greater risk when taking these medications (baseline gastroparesis, bowel obstructions, or pancreatitis, for example, can dramatically worsen side effects). Many of these drugs are administered subcutaneously, and a medical professional can also discuss weight loss injection safety to make sure that you don’t injure yourself (side effects of improper subcutaneous injection can include bruising and haematoma).
It is also very important that you only take the recommended dosage of any medication that you are prescribed. Taking more than the recommended dosage may increase your risk of side effects, including severe ones.
Bariatric Surgery: An Alternative Approach to Weight Loss
If you are struggling with obesity and want your best chance to lose weight and keep it off for life, bariatric surgery is a safe and proven measure. At a comprehensive MBSAQIP Center of Excellence in Metabolic and Bariatric Surgery like the Bariatric and Metabolic Center of Colorado (BMCC), the complication rate is very low (under 5%). If a patient does experience complications, then our double-board-certified bariatric surgeon personally commits to working with them every step of the way in order to get the complication resolved.
Bariatric surgery is also extremely effective. In conjunction with diet and exercise (see our blog about the best exercises for weight loss), bariatric surgery has helped patients to lose 65-100% of their excess weight and keep it off. Imagine how that would feel.
Bariatric surgery is also more affordable than second-generation weight loss medications like Ozempic or Mounjaro. These medications are rarely covered by insurance, and cost the average patient $13,000 to $15,000 per year. By contrast, at the BMCC our out-of-pocket costs start at around $12,000.
Most of our patients say that the decision to undergo bariatric surgery was the best decision they ever made.
“I feel like I have won the lottery and have been given a second chance in life! March 25, 2014 was the first day of the rest of my new life and I can’t even start to express in words how grateful I am.”—Rochelle Goforth, gastric bypass patient.
If you’re suffering, don’t wait. Contact our Denver office today.
