3 ms·

It's not clear to me that the risk to lean muscle tissue is unique to GLP-1 drugs. The counter point is that the risk exists in practically any severely calorie

by bumby 4y ago

It's not clear to me that the risk to lean muscle tissue is unique to GLP-1 drugs. The counter point is that the risk exists in practically any severely calorie restricted plan. In other words, the reason why most treatments work is by reducing calories and if you reduce them too fast, any of those treatments will put lean body mass at risk.

nradov 4y ago
When a patient loses weight, some fraction of that will always be lean muscle mass. The issue with GLP-1 drugs is that fraction tends to be higher than with other approaches to weight loss. See the link I posted above for details which should make the risk clear to you. There are circumstances when those drugs are medically indicated. However, it seems they are being over prescribed without proper consideration of the harmful side effects.
- bumby 4y ago
  The link doesn’t actually cover all the material listed, only the first 27 minutes. It looks like the relevant stuff came later. Was that higher fraction compared to equally drastic calorie reduction in other methods in a RCT?
  - nradov 4y ago
    Basically yes, but there are nuances too complex to summarize in a brief comment here. If anyone is considering taking one of those drugs then I highly recommend subscribing to watch the entire video and read the show notes (including the linked scientific papers). There is a subscription fee but the it's a fraction of the price of the drugs and the information is top notch.
    - bumby 4y ago
      Can you link those articles directly? I have access to a lot of journals but it’s more out of curiosity than being a candidate for the drugs. Edit: from what I could read from Attia’s other posts were studies where the control was a reduced calorie placebo group. However, they weren’t controlled to reduce calories to the same extent as the semaglutide group. This still leaves the question open as to whether the side effects are due mainly to the extent of calorie reduction (which could occur through other treatments) or due to some other mechanism unique to the drug.

by bumby 4y ago

nradov 4y ago

When a patient loses weight, some fraction of that will always be lean muscle mass. The issue with GLP-1 drugs is that fraction tends to be higher than with other approaches to weight loss. See the link I posted above for details which should make the risk clear to you. There are circumstances when those drugs are medically indicated. However, it seems they are being over prescribed without proper consideration of the harmful side effects.

bumby 4y ago
The link doesn’t actually cover all the material listed, only the first 27 minutes. It looks like the relevant stuff came later. Was that higher fraction compared to equally drastic calorie reduction in other methods in a RCT?
- nradov 4y ago
  Basically yes, but there are nuances too complex to summarize in a brief comment here. If anyone is considering taking one of those drugs then I highly recommend subscribing to watch the entire video and read the show notes (including the linked scientific papers). There is a subscription fee but the it's a fraction of the price of the drugs and the information is top notch.
  - bumby 4y ago
    Can you link those articles directly? I have access to a lot of journals but it’s more out of curiosity than being a candidate for the drugs. Edit: from what I could read from Attia’s other posts were studies where the control was a reduced calorie placebo group. However, they weren’t controlled to reduce calories to the same extent as the semaglutide group. This still leaves the question open as to whether the side effects are due mainly to the extent of calorie reduction (which could occur through other treatments) or due to some other mechanism unique to the drug.