What is Semaglutide?
Semaglutide is a weight loss drug recently approved by the Food and Drug Administration. As you read this article, you will come across key information about how semaglutide can help people lose weight. We will also discuss what other possible effects may appear for semaglutide to work properly. So, let us see how it became such a promising weight loss drug today.
Semaglutide is used along with diet and exercise to improve weight loss in adults with excess body weight (body mass index [BMI] ≥27) or who are otherwise at risk of developing obesity-related diseases.
When used as an adjunct to diet and exercise, the medication can help lower blood sugar levels in adults with type 2 diabetes. It is effective for those with obesity who have other risk factors for heart disease and diabetes. Semaglutide is injected once weekly just under the skin (subcutaneously) and does not require any changes in diet or lifestyle. Similar to insulin, the medication reaches the liver where it is converted into a form that can be used by cells.
Intake of semaglutide for weight loss
If you’ve decided to take semaglutide for weight loss, you have come to the right place! We will walk you through how to take semaglutide, as well as what precautions should be taken.
Semaglutide is a once-daily injectable drug that has been developed specifically for weight management. It’s different from other weight-loss pills, though it shares some of the same benefits that they do: increased metabolism suppressed appetite, and lowered food intake. Aside from that, semaglutide also has a gut-busting effect that helps reduce fat mass. It also has other beneficial effects on health and body composition.
Semaglutide is a synthetic analog of the human glucagon-like peptide 1 (GLP-1) hormone secreted by the cells of the pancreas. Like GLP-1, semaglutide plays a role in regulating food intake. It stimulates the release of insulin from pancreatic beta cells, thereby reducing overall blood glucose levels. Since semaglutide acts similarly to its natural precursor—GLP-1—it works by suppressing appetite and causing weight loss. It functions like insulin outside the body.
In addition to its effects on insulin and glucose levels, semaglutide also increases levels of satiety-signaling hormones in your gut. All of these effects work together to help patients lose weight when taking semaglutide.
When taken once a day by mouth, semaglutide effectively reduces food intake for up to three days in a row without the need for extra injections.
Significance of semaglutide in weight loss
As part of our effort to make treatment for adults with diabetes more affordable and accessible, we are updating our long-acting glucagon-like peptide (GLP)-1 receptor agonist (GLP-1RA) product.
A significant change is an introduction of the second new GLP-1RA product, semaglutide, which was approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Semaglutide is a next-generation, once-weekly GLP-1RA with improved bioavailability and pharmacokinetics, which allows for once-weekly dosing.
In addition to the reduction in cost per week, other features of this new formulation may provide important advantages that result in a more convenient and easier-to-use product for patients who need to use it as part of their diabetes and weight management. Among these advantages are improved patient convenience; greater ease in dosing accuracy; and increased time before the next injection.
Me Only Better offers a personalized weight loss program San Diego that includes nutritional guidance, exercise plans, and ongoing support to help you achieve your weight loss goals and improve your overall health.
Advantages of semaglutide
One of the key advantages of semaglutide is that it is a next-generation GLP-1RA with improved, once-weekly dosing and a simple dosing schedule of 1 injection per week. The dose is just 1 mg per weekly injection and it’s available in a pre-filled pen, so patients can avoid the inconvenience of having to inject multiple times each day.
Compared to the first-generation GLP-1RA, exenatide, and semaglutide have lower variability in blood glucose levels (4).
Semaglutide is a new type of medication that was approved by the FDA. It works by suppressing ghrelin, which is a hormone that causes you to feel hungry.
Semaglutide and it’s functioning in the body
There are three main types of hunger hormones: orexin-A; orexin B; and ghrelin. Ghrelin is the most potent hunger hormone and it causes you to feel hungry all day long. When this happens, your brain releases other hormones (areas, where they release, include the hypothalamus). These hormones tell you when it’s time to eat again, triggering eating behaviors like snacking or overindulging in meals.
The orexin A, orexin B, and ghrelin hormones are released in a coordinated pattern, which gives you an optimal feeling of being full. But when you consistently eat over these frequencies of release, your brain adapts to this pattern and will release less of these hormones. This makes it harder for your body to know when you’re getting hungry.
So, this new medication works by working with the hypothalamus to give you more signals about what you’re eating (and losing weight). When you take semaglutide daily, it affects your appetite and helps keep the stomach from emptying too quickly at meal times. This means that food doesn’t get into your bloodstream too fast so you can feel full longer. This also helps prevent over-eating in between meals.
For example, if you normally eat dinner and then eat something before bed, semaglutide will make you more sensitive to food cues during the day. So, when there’s food around you’re more likely to feel hungry even though you’ve already eaten. It will also help keep your stomach from emptying too fast at night.
Semaglutide functions by suppressing ghrelin or promoting body weight loss in obese individuals.
How does semaglutide work for weight loss?
Semaglutide works by activating orexin-dependent pathways in the brain (which facilitate weight loss) and also activates orexin receptors (which also play a role in satiety). The result is that you are less likely to eat as much as you want.
Also, semaglutide interacts with many other medications either by blocking how they work or by replacing them. It’s often used at the same time as ampakine drugs, which are used to treat sleep disorders.