A New York dermatologist coined the phrase “Ozempic face” to explain the sagging, deflated facial options that develop after weight reduction achieved with the drug semaglutide, a glucagon-like peptide, or GLP-1, agonist offered by Novo Nordisk as Ozempic for kind 2 diabetes or Wegovy for weight reduction. Ozempic customers usually lose 10-16 kilos, extra with the higher-dose Wegovy. The medication are injected as soon as weekly, accompanied by nausea and vomiting in 50% of customers, can enhance danger for thyroid most cancers and pancreatitis, and value round $1000-$1500 per thirty days. Though initially authorized just for kind 2 diabetes, the burden loss impact has brought about a scarcity of the medication in some areas, since individuals wanting to drop some weight have emptied pharmacies.
However this phenomenon highlights a number of drawbacks of dropping pounds by this route:
- GLP-1 medication work by decreasing urge for food and thereby calorie consumption. Weight reduction achieved by lowered calorie consumption are related to lack of muscle. For each 10 kilos misplaced, about 3 kilos are from muscle loss. This isn’t a benign phenomenon, as it’s related to lowered metabolic price that makes future weight reduction harder, typically inconceivable. It’s also related to elevated mortality, regardless of the advantages of fats loss.
- Many of the fats misplaced is from subcutaneous fats within the buttocks, thighs, chest, arms, and, sure, face, much less misplaced from belly visceral fats. It is a drawback as a result of almost all the issues related to chubby and weight problems are usually not as a result of subcutaneous however to belly visceral fats. Stomach fats that surrounds the intestines, liver, pancreas, and many others. is accountable for a lot of the well being issues related to extra weight resembling insulin resistance, hormonal disruption, and elevated potential for kind 2 diabetes, hypertension, coronary heart illness, cancers, and cognitive decline/dementia. Weight reduction with GLP-1 agonist medication improves modestly on this profile with an approximate 50:50 lack of subcutaneous:visceral fats. As a result of there may be subcutaneous fats misplaced with most food plan and GLP-1 agonists, the lack of facial fats is a matter that may present the looks of accelerated growing old.
After all, dermatologists are stumped since their considering not often goes past topical steroids and filler injections. They’re due to this fact advising individuals with the sagging pores and skin of Ozempic face to endure expensive beauty procedures to treatment the looks of accelerated growing old. It’s the standard healthcare paradigm: “deal with” with prescribed drugs and procedures, then introduce extra prescribed drugs and procedures to repair the issues that consequence. In spite of everything, healthcare is about cash, not well being.
Wouldn’t or not it’s higher to drop some weight with a technique that particularly favors lack of belly visceral fats and thereby yields larger metabolic enhancements whereas not inflicting lack of subcutaneous fats out of your face? You obtain this by addressing insulin resistance via adjustments in food plan (eliminating meals that provoke insulin resembling wheat, grains, sugars), addressing frequent nutrient deficiencies resembling magnesium, omega-3 fatty acids, iodine, and vitamin D that affect insulin responses, then managing your gastrointestinal microbiome, i.e., all of the methods we use in my packages and outlined in my books and DrDavisInfiniteHealth.com web site. There’s due to this fact much less lack of subcutaneous fats from areas such because the face, since normalizing insulin responsiveness favors lack of belly fats. There’s additionally little to no lack of muscle mass.
Go just a few steps additional and interact in methods that enhance dermal collagen and protect or enhance muscle mass, as outlined on this earlier weblog publish. Shedding pounds this manner is cheap, yields an extended checklist of different well being advantages, no expensive fillers or different procedures required to compensate.
