Weight loss was maintained one year after courses of semaglutide and liraglutide

American researchers analyzed patient databases and concluded that the reduction in body weight under the influence of glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1, GPP-1) agonists persists for a year after drug withdrawal. Joe Deckert and colleagues at Epic Research (the research wing of Epic Systems, a company that makes electronic medical records software) analyzed the Cosmos Collaboration database, which includes the charts of more than 227 million patients at nearly 30,000 medical facilities in all U.S. states and Lebanon that use the software. 20274 of those patients were taking semaglutide as prescribed by their doctor, and their body weight dropped by at least five pounds (about 2.27 kilograms); another 17733 were receiving liraglutide with the same result. The findings are published on the Epic Research website.

It found that among people who received semaglutide, 17.7 percent had completely returned to or gained over their original weight one year after completing a course of the drug. However, 56.2 percent of patients had no increase in body weight or an additional decrease in body weight compared to their levels at the end of the regimen. In those receiving liraglutide, these figures were 18.7 and 55.7 percent, respectively.