New Zealand dietitians are alerting the public to the side effects of weight loss medications Wegovy and Ozempic.
Wegovy was made available by prescription in New Zealand last week.
Registered dietitian and Dietitians New Zealand spokeswoman Lily Henderson said that there were nutrition-related side effects to the drugs and that medical oversight was important.
While a Gore GP said the GLP-1 receptor agonist medications should be treated as another tool of managing obesity and its health consequences.
Mrs Henderson said the drug suppressed hunger and then calorie intake was reduced so significantly that it could cause nutrient deficiencies, muscle loss and decreased bone density.
"They change the way in which you eat ... but they don't actually change what your body needs," she said.
This meant those taking the medication might not be eating enough fibre, protein or various sorts of vitamins and minerals.
This was why her organisation recommended working with a dietitian, to ensure those nutritional needs were met.
Rapid weight loss had a "real risk" of losing lean muscle mass, she said.
"We want to go into our older age with, as much muscle mass as possible."
For older adults, muscle mass was important for when they had falls and for them and for females, preserving bone density was also important, she said.
The key positive effect of both drugs, when prescribed appropriately for weight loss or diabetic reasons, were reducing constant cravings or "food noise" in a patient.
"You're just not thinking about food all the time, so you're not driven to kind of consuming food in the way that you may have previously."
New Zealand benefitted from receiving the drug later than other countries, so we could better understand its impact, she said.
As the drug was not subsidised by Pharmac, the $500-$600 cost per month was not sustainable, she said.
"There's a huge barrier to people who would benefit from them and are unable to access them because of the cost."
Gore Medical Centre GP Dr Glenys Weir KSM said the drug should be used as part of a whole lifestyle approach and not relied on solely, because of its cost.
"My reservations are that people often want a quick fix but I don't think these new drugs, will be able to do this," she said.
"‘They are very expensive and so are not within the budget for a lot of our patients."
Appropriate situations where Wegovy would be prescribed were for people with diabetes, arthritis of the weight bearing joints, hips and knees, hypertension and some heart conditions, she said.
