A recent study conducted at St Vincent’s University Hospital has found that weight-loss medications such as Ozempic may not only curb appetite but could also enhance metabolism, leading to increased calorie burning. This discovery challenges the prevailing belief that these medications primarily work by reducing food intake, suggesting instead that they play a more active role in boosting the body’s metabolic rate.
The study, published in the Journal of the Obesity Society on Thursday, involved a randomized controlled trial with 30 patients. The research revealed that individuals with low metabolic activity before beginning treatment showed the most significant benefits from using medications like Ozempic, Wegovy, and Monjaro.
Participants underwent specialized imaging of abdominal fat using a PET-CT scanner, both before and after six months of treatment. The results indicated a “strong relationship” between the increased metabolic activity induced by the daily medication and the amount of weight lost.
Professor Donal O’Shea, who led the trial in collaboration with UCD’s School of Medicine, emphasized the significance of these findings. “The strength of the association is surprising given the relatively small sample size and suggests that this increase in metabolic activity is a crucial factor in how these drugs operate,” he said.
Prof. O’Shea pointed out that one of the body’s primary defenses against weight loss is to reduce its energy expenditure. The study is the first to demonstrate in humans that these medications not only prevent this natural slowdown but actually enhance the body’s calorie-burning capacity.
However, Prof. O’Shea noted that further research is necessary to fully understand the mechanisms behind this effect, emphasizing that the development of safe medical treatments for obesity is still in its early stages.
“It always seemed overly simplistic to me that these new treatments merely caused people to eat less,” Prof. O’Shea remarked. “This study represents an exciting step forward in our understanding of how these new obesity medications work. The findings also support the idea that treating obesity involves more than just ‘eating less and moving more’—the process is far more complex.”
This study underscores the need for continued research into how weight-loss medications interact with the body’s metabolic processes, paving the way for more effective treatments for obesity in the future.
