Saxenda vs. Wegovy
Weight loss injections are FDA-approved medications patients can utilize along with diet modifications and exercise to lose weight and improve their well-being. Researchers have leveraged new insights into the underlying causes of obesity to develop these medications, which suppress patients’ appetite by mimicking the effects of naturally occurring gut hormones.
Weight loss injections taken as part of a medical weight loss program can help patients manage chronic obesity. These treatments can improve your quality of life while enhancing your overall health, and they’ve been proven to be safe and effective for weight loss.
Several new injections have become available in the last 10 years, including Saxenda and Wegovy. If you are considering a medical weight loss program, it’s essential to learn about these medications. Understanding their similarities and differences will help you have a productive discussion with your doctor and make the best decision for your health.
What is Saxenda?
Saxenda is a brand-name drug whose active ingredient is liraglutide. It gained FDA approval as a chronic obesity treatment in December of 2014. When developing possible GLP-1 analogs, researchers concluded liraglutide was the best option thanks to its extended half-life and receptor potency.
Patients can only obtain Saxenda from a pharmacy in predosed pens. The most common side effects are nausea, diarrhea, and constipation.
What is Wegovy?
Wegovy is a brand-name drug whose active ingredient is semaglutide. It gained FDA approval as a chronic obesity treatment in June of 2021. Side effects include nausea, constipation, dizziness, and fatigue.
Researchers were able to build on their discoveries with liraglutide to create an agonist with a longer half-life that could effectively mimic the effects of gut hormones. Semaglutide is also the active ingredient in Ozempic, a type 2 diabetes medication that doctors use off-label as a weight loss treatment.
Similarities Between Saxenda and Wegovy
Saxenda and Wegovy are both manufactured by Novo Nordisk. The FDA recommends the medications for adults with body mass indexes (BMIs) over 30 or those with BMIs over 27 and a weight-related medical condition such as high cholesterol. Both are only available with a prescription from a licensed doctor.
The medications belong to a group of drugs called glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) receptor agonists. They help patients lose weight by engaging with the same receptors as naturally produced gut hormones that influence digestion and appetite.
The body stores excess calories from digested food as fat. Burning more calories than you consume forces the body to burn fat for energy, leading to weight loss.
GLP-1 agonists help you create a caloric deficit by slowing digestion. This action keeps the stomach fuller for longer, reducing how many calories you take in. The medication also interacts with the area of the brain responsible for appetite. When you eat, the drug helps signal to the body that you feel sated, reducing caloric intake.
Differences Between Saxenda and Wegovy
Saxenda is a daily medication patients take in 3.0 mg doses. Doctors typically recommend patients build up to a therapeutic dose using a 0.6 mg increase over five weeks.
Wegovy is the first weight loss injection patients can use weekly. You can incrementally increase your dose over five months until you reach the complete 2.4 mg dose. Wegovy takes longer for your body to absorb and break down, meaning it remains effective longer than Saxenda.
Wegovy is also a newer medication than Saxenda, though both have undergone rigorous clinical trials to obtain FDA approval. Further study is needed, but evidence suggests semaglutide helps mitigate food cravings more effectively than liraglutide.
Saxenda carries a higher risk of injection site irritation and reaction because patients inject it daily. Rotating the injection site between the abdomen, thigh, and upper arm helps reduce this risk, but the injection frequency means each site receives more injections than with Wegovy.
Additionally, although Wegovy and Saxenda contain different active ingredients, it is unsafe to take multiple GLP-1 medications simultaneously.
Which is More Effective for Weight Loss?
Differences in patients’ biochemistry and medical history can influence the effectiveness of different drugs, but research shows that Wegovy is more effective for weight loss than Saxenda. One recent clinical trial with 338 patients reported that those taking semaglutide lost an average of 15.8% of their weight, while patients using liraglutide lost 6.4%.
The same study also noted that only 13.5% of patients using semaglutide discontinued treatment. That rate was 27.6% for patients using liraglutide. Some researchers have proposed that the adjustment period during the tiered dose increases may be easier to manage with semaglutide than liraglutide.
It is also easier to administer Wegovy since it only requires weekly injections. On the other hand, patients must inject Saxenda daily. Missed doses of the medication and altered timing can negatively affect the injections’ effectiveness. Maintaining a consistent schedule is easier with the weekly Wegovy injection.
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Wegovy Injection Overview
https://www.healthline.com/health/drugs/wegovy -
FDA’s Concerns with Unapproved GLP-1 Drugs Used for Weight Loss
https://www.fda.gov/drugs/postmarket-drug-safety-information-patients-and-providers/medications-containing-semaglutide-marketed-type-2-diabetes-or-weight-loss -
Semaglutide Promotes More Weight Loss in Nondiabetic Adults Than Liraglutide
https://www.uspharmacist.com/article/semaglutide-promotes-more-weight-loss-in-nondiabetic-adults-than-liraglutide -
Effect of Weekly Subcutaneous Semaglutide vs Daily Liraglutide on Body Weight in Adults With Overweight or Obesity Without Diabetes
https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2787907
October 16, 2023
Written By
Dr. Avidon Appel
Fact-checked By
Dr. Avidon Appel
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