A new patient-friendly digest has appeared in the waiting room of my clinic. The front page features a beaming woman around 60 who proclaims, “I love what I see in the mirror now!” Her GLP-1 testimonial follows the typical plot line in drug ads: a relatable character feels trapped in their chronic illness. They’ve tried everything, and all that’s left is discouragement. Then, they hear about the new elixir and ask their doctor. Soon their vitality floods back, and they find themselves clinking beverages with dear friends on a pontoon boat.
The magazine emphasizes in bold print the beginning, middle, and triumphant end of the patient’s struggle:
“The scale fluctuated so many times.”
“I asked my doctor about GLP-1s.”
“Finally, I’m maintaining my weight loss!”
As a GLP-1 prescriber, I have to wonder if her account was varnished. There is no mention of any hiccups getting the medication covered by insurance. She apparently suffered no side effects, unlike the majority of GLP-1 users. And she has not attempted to wean off the medication, which tends to cause total rebound of weight.
Turn the page, and a full-spread advertisement invites us to “Discover the Power of Wegovy.” Many of my clinic’s patients did not graduate high school and might gloss over the fine print. It includes:
“Wegovy may harm your unborn baby…”
“It is not known if Wegovy will cause thyroid tumors…”
“Wegovy may cause…pancreatitis…gallbladder problems…hypoglycemia…kidney failure…severe stomach problems…change in vision…increased heart rate…food or liquid getting into the lungs during surgery or other procedures that use anesthesia…depression or thoughts of suicide…”
More educated patients who can read the fine print still would not learn about lean muscle loss, which accounts for up to 40% of weight loss on a GLP-1. And crucially, there is no discussion of the opportunity cost.
How much time would someone have for a nutrition jumpstart program if they weren’t saddled with GLP-1 follow-up appointments? How much money would they save for vibrant produce if they weren’t spending it on appetite suppressants? How much freedom would they have to hit the gym if they weren’t incapacitated by nausea?
An investment firm describes this magazine as “a healthcare marketing platform” delivering “high-quality medical education to patients and healthcare professionals directly at the point of care and beyond.” However strategic it is for pharmaceutical affiliates to disguise marketing as education, their deception has consequences outside the executive suite.
Every day I see patients on GLP-1’s with gastrointestinal uproar, insurance fiascos, plateauing weight entrenched in the obese range, plateauing sugar stuck in the diabetic range, plateauing blood pressure pulsing in the hypertensive range—you get the idea. Is anyone actually being healed by GLP-1s?
Patients are further enmeshed in the pseudo-medical web with the American Association of Clinical Endocrinology (AACE) serving as content reviewer for this magazine. While nurturing top-tier sponsor and Wegovy maker Novo Nordisk in its pocket, AACE shamelessly disclaims, “The appearance of advertising [for Wegovy] does not imply endorsement of or guarantee the claims of the advertisers.”
Perhaps a personal silver lining to the corporate capture of healthcare is that it makes me keenly averse to bias. I recognize that the magazine encourages dietary fiber and 150 minutes of exercise per week. I appreciate its endorsing the Mediterranean diet, which involves a fraction of the animal products consumed by the average American. I agree that GLP-1s are the lesser evil in some cases, and have seen them lend people temporary relief.
But obesity is not a Wegovy deficiency. Healthcare needs to reclaim its credibility by getting out of bed with the industry, getting dressed and going to work for patients instead of profit.
herbivores.life 