Department of Medicine

Endocrinologist Matthew Gilbert, D.O., M.P.H., professor of medicine

(JULY 10, 2024) Endocrinologist Matthew Gilbert, D.O., M.P.H., professor of medicine, commented for a story in Yahoo Finance News on whether or not weight-loss drugs can be used as a temporary “metabolic reset” to solve the long-term problem of obesity with a short-term solution.

Appetite-curbing GLP-1 medications, including Ozempic, Wegovy, and Zepbound, appear to be startlingly effective for weight loss, a game changer for many people with obesity. But the notion that these drugs can “reset” your metabolism and be discontinued once the target weight has been achieved is contentious. These medicines are intended as long-term commitments, like medication for high blood pressure—they are not meant to be taken temporarily. The preponderance of medical trials so far show that, generally, people who stop taking the drugs regain most of the weight they’ve lost within about a year.

Several weight-loss startups market GLP-1s as temporary treatments that offer long-term effects, using such language, for example, as “temporary aid to improve your metabolic health” or “always with the clear aim of a healthy transition off medication once you’ve reached your goals.”

The solution that some weight-loss startups suggest for customers who stop using weight-loss drugs might sound simple, and familiar: diet, exercise, sleep, emotional health. But decades of data show these lifestyle changes are far easier said than done for many Americans—and it’s often because diet and exercise aren’t working for people that they decide to go on GLP-1 medications in the first place.

“We’ve been talking about lifestyle modification and diet and exercise for decades and decades, and we haven’t seen that be really as effective of an intervention as we would have liked, right?” Gilbert says. “Americans keep continuing to gain weight.”

In short, doctors say, there is no such thing as a “metabolic reset.” It remains to be seen how all these weight-loss startups will fare as more and more patients quit their weight-loss medications.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com