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Ozempic linked to stomach paralysis, other gastrointestinal issues: UBC study

globalnews.ca

41–50 of 89 posts

Re: Ozempic linked to stomach paralysis, other gastrointestinal issues: UBC study

#41
post #32
post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

His doctor isn't monitoring correctly. They should drop the dose. Standard treatment is start with a really smart dose then you double it each month for 5 months. In reality, if you're losing weight, you should just keep on that dosage.

May be his pharmacy struggling with supply -- I hear lots of folks are titrating outside of the guidelines because they can't get the appropriate dosage.

I wish more folks would get comfortable crushing tablets and weighing out their own dosage on scales. It’s not that hard to cut tabs in half or crush two and make 3 doses out of those, then put them back into caps. Empty gelatin caps are cheap and easy to work with.

Should anyone have to do this? Of course not, but if the choice is between this or projectile vomit every waking hour, it’s not a hard choice IMO.

Lastly, I just wanted to take a moment to think about how useless pharmacies have become that they can’t actually do this for you anymore and literally just count out pills, or more realistically push a button on a machine that counts out the correct amount.

Re: Ozempic linked to stomach paralysis, other gastrointestinal issues: UBC study

#42
post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anyone is welcome to be fat and happy, but don't put down those who want to un-fat to be happy. Don't come back with that fatness is a social construct stuff either; your fat and happy idea is just as much a social construct.

And please don't ask me to pay for your healthcare because you chose to be fat and happy.

I hate this sentiment. It can be used about, well, anything at all that might cause your risk of anything to go up as far as science understands it today (which might be different tomorrow, they're always learning).

Accident while biking? Nope - too risky, no care for you. Eat red meat and get cancer? Too bad, no treatment for you. Same for drinking wine, or doing any of the thousands of things "they" say MAY raise your cancer risk.

Joint problems happen to all manner of people, thin or fat, but we'll only pay for treatment for the thin ones.

It just goes on.

Re: Ozempic linked to stomach paralysis, other gastrointestinal issues: UBC study

#43
post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately not really, because the infrastructure that allows us to glean insights from actual healthcare practices is abysmal/nonexistent, at least in the US. It became clear during COVID that a lot of people seem to presume there's some way for researchers to just "look at what's happening," and there isn't.

There's no nationwide research infrastructure for gleaning insights like that. But large provider organizations have huge patient populations and do a lot of research. They have multiple studies underway for Ozempic and similar drugs.

Clinical research trials are a lot more useful as they get a lot more data points from far fewer patients. Not many people want to get blood drawn every week and keep a detailed daily journal about eating and exercise habits.

Re: Ozempic linked to stomach paralysis, other gastrointestinal issues: UBC study

#44
post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We can! But should we? Being fat is similar to being a drug user. At first, you actually are fat and happy. Over time, being fat will absolutely reduce your happiness from the medical, societal, and physical issues that arise. Similar to how drug users build up a tolerance and instead of using the drug to be happy, they use the drug to feel normal. And just to state a simple fact, I do not condone shaming people with…

I have thought of this before. But it isn't really the same. Drugs, the really bad ones will probably ruin your life or kill you in the space of two or three years. Being fat unless it's super super severe often won't start impacting your health seriously until your 30's or 40's. on the opposite side anorexia will kill you much faster than obesity

> on the opposite side anorexia will kill you much faster than obesity

* Anorexia nervosa, about 5.1 deaths per 1000 person-years

* Obesity, about 200 deaths per 1000 person-years.

Re: Ozempic linked to stomach paralysis, other gastrointestinal issues: UBC study

#45
post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

May be his pharmacy struggling with supply -- I hear lots of folks are titrating outside of the guidelines because they can't get the appropriate dosage.

I wish more folks would get comfortable crushing tablets and weighing out their own dosage on scales. It’s not that hard to cut tabs in half or crush two and make 3 doses out of those, then put them back into caps. Empty gelatin caps are cheap and easy to work with. Should anyone have to do this? Of course not, but if the choice is between this or projectile vomit every waking hour, it’s not a hard choice IMO. Lastly…

Ozempic is an injection administered weekly not a pill that can be split.

Re: Ozempic linked to stomach paralysis, other gastrointestinal issues: UBC study

#46
post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

May be his pharmacy struggling with supply -- I hear lots of folks are titrating outside of the guidelines because they can't get the appropriate dosage.

I wish more folks would get comfortable crushing tablets and weighing out their own dosage on scales. It’s not that hard to cut tabs in half or crush two and make 3 doses out of those, then put them back into caps. Empty gelatin caps are cheap and easy to work with. Should anyone have to do this? Of course not, but if the choice is between this or projectile vomit every waking hour, it’s not a hard choice IMO. Lastly…

Ozempic is a pen-style injector, not a pill.

Re: Ozempic linked to stomach paralysis, other gastrointestinal issues: UBC study

#47
post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

May be his pharmacy struggling with supply -- I hear lots of folks are titrating outside of the guidelines because they can't get the appropriate dosage.

I wish more folks would get comfortable crushing tablets and weighing out their own dosage on scales. It’s not that hard to cut tabs in half or crush two and make 3 doses out of those, then put them back into caps. Empty gelatin caps are cheap and easy to work with. Should anyone have to do this? Of course not, but if the choice is between this or projectile vomit every waking hour, it’s not a hard choice IMO. Lastly…

I agree with your general point, although (and it may not be the same everywhere, but is certainly true in the UK) Ozempic is supplied as a pre-filled pen injector that handles the dose for you, and is taken once a week - there are no markings for a half-dose (and the patient info sheet seems to suggest that a partial dose isn't possible)

Re: Ozempic linked to stomach paralysis, other gastrointestinal issues: UBC study

#48
post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

May be his pharmacy struggling with supply -- I hear lots of folks are titrating outside of the guidelines because they can't get the appropriate dosage.

I wish more folks would get comfortable crushing tablets and weighing out their own dosage on scales. It’s not that hard to cut tabs in half or crush two and make 3 doses out of those, then put them back into caps. Empty gelatin caps are cheap and easy to work with. Should anyone have to do this? Of course not, but if the choice is between this or projectile vomit every waking hour, it’s not a hard choice IMO. Lastly…

[deleted]

Re: Ozempic linked to stomach paralysis, other gastrointestinal issues: UBC study

#49
post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

May be his pharmacy struggling with supply -- I hear lots of folks are titrating outside of the guidelines because they can't get the appropriate dosage.

I wish more folks would get comfortable crushing tablets and weighing out their own dosage on scales. It’s not that hard to cut tabs in half or crush two and make 3 doses out of those, then put them back into caps. Empty gelatin caps are cheap and easy to work with. Should anyone have to do this? Of course not, but if the choice is between this or projectile vomit every waking hour, it’s not a hard choice IMO. Lastly…

don't some medicines have a time delay release mechanism that this would defeat? getting that much of a dose of some medicines all at once wouldn't be ideal I'd think. caveat emptor and all that.

Re: Ozempic linked to stomach paralysis, other gastrointestinal issues: UBC study

#50
I don't know to what extent this kind of perspective matters compared to the obviously more common usage of obese people with serious diet control problems, but I come at this more from a physique sport angle. I have no real interest in getting big and don't want to use steroids, so I don't actually compete, but I do lift nearly every day, run nearly every day, and have become extremely lean, probably currently somewhere in the area of 6-7%. My experience of using this myself and of seeing other people use it is from this perspective, people who were never all that fat to begin with and are just looking for it to be easier to be extremely not fat.

And in those communities and in my personal experience, this kind of thing virtually never happens. I've been in a calorie deficit since roughly mid May at this point, and have felt no nausea, haven't vomited, have felt nothing, really. I can barely tell I'm taking a drug. The only perceivable effect is I'm not hungry, and this seems to be the common takeaway from bodybuilders and models and what not doing this. My wife has been taking it for over a year and a half now and has had no side effects.

But I'm not out there trying to maintain my pizza and ice cream diet while outsourcing portion control to a drug. I'm also not trying to lose 80 pounds in a year. I don't eat out, weigh and measure and plan all of my food, and haven't had a dessert or a drop of alcohol since last Christmas. Likely won't have another until this Christmas.

It's just something to keep in mind depending on your specific goals. I feel like, at least until I stopped reading the news, I was getting bombarded almost daily with scare articles like this claiming you'll be miserable, sick, your face will sag and age prematurely, all kinds of ridiculous shit. I can't speak to what it's like to have lifelong problems with food habits and to be over a hundred pounds past the recommended BMI range, or what any means of changing that will do to you. But if you are a reasonably fit person who wants to be absolutely shredded, or someone who has been and can be shredded and has lost weight plenty of times before, but just want it to not be a miserable four months, these drugs are absolute gold. Not just bodybuilders, but dancers, gymnasts, climbers, weight class fighter, anyone with a strong incentive to be very lean most of the time. Maybe we don't matter as much to public health compared to fighting the obesity epidemic, and maybe we're not very common on a place like Hacker News where most readers are probably sedentary and have never been athletes, but we're still a demographic and the GLP-1 revolution has been a godsend for us. They're far safer than anything that existed previously. They just take what you were already doing and put it in easy mode.

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