By Rich Weil, M.Ed., CDE
Transformation Weight Control
transformationweightcontrol.com
As safe and effective as the new GLP-1 Receptor Agonists are at helping people lose weight, and they are indeed effective, it’s important to include lifestyle changes to complement the effects of the meds. That is, focusing on your diet/nutrition and physical activity/exercise. You will be well served to do so. For instance, the weight loss at 72 weeks for *Zepbound (tirzepatide) was 20.9% of initial body weight, but when lifestyle changes were included, the weight loss was 25% of initial body weight, a 20% increase! And it’s just not that. Exercise and complete nutrition will contribute a tremendous amount to your health, over and above the effect of weight loss, and in fact, even if you never lost a pound, exercise has profound effects on improving health, including improvements in cardiovascular disease, diabetes, high blood pressure, stroke, insulin resistance and blood glucose (sugar) control, endothelial cell dysfunction, visceral fat, sarcopenia, osteoporosis, several types of cancer, fatty liver disease, depression and anxiety, cognitive function, and many other health conditions.
This is a screenshot from a National Institutes of Health website. The government does a very good job of collecting, studying, and presenting information about exercise and nutrition. You can read more at the source posted below the screenshot.
If that’s not enough to convince you, consider these package inserts from the GLP-1 receptor agonists Ozempic and Wegovy. Ozempic is FDA approved for diabetes and Wegovy for weight loss (they are both semaglutide). When I first read these package inserts, I thought the pharmaceutical company just had to say that because the FDA required them to. But I was wrong. Research such as the Zepbound data I showed above, and observations of individuals in our weight loss program show that those who are taking weight loss meds and engage the most in lifestyle changes lose more weight than individuals who take the medications but don’t pay attention to lifestyle change.
REMEMBER! It’s never too late to start exercising and paying attention to healthy nutrition!
* Zepbound (tirzepatide) is a GLP-1 receptor agonist and GIP hormone (glucose-dependent insulinotropic polypeptide) approved for weight loss by the FDA. The citations for the research are: Garvey et al The Lancet 2023, and Jastreboff et al The New England Journal of Medicine 2022
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