As early as November last year, Danish pharmaceutical giant Novo Nordisk officially claimed that its globally popular weight loss drug Wegovy (chemical name Smegglutide) can reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease.
But at that time, there were doubts that the benefits of Wegovy for the heart may be indirectly achieved through weight loss, rather than the direct effect of the drug itself.
This week, a new experimental study found that the benefits of Wegovy, a weight loss miracle drug, in reducing the risk of heart disease and stroke are not closely related to the patient's own weight changes. This means that Wegovy itself does indeed have benefits for the cardiovascular system, and those at cardiovascular risk who do not need to lose weight may also be suitable for this "miracle drug".
Reducing cardiovascular risk is not solely due to weight loss
This experiment called Select was led by John Deanfield, a professor of cardiology at University College London in the UK. This experiment was the cornerstone for Novo Nordisk to persuade insurance companies to pay for Wegovy.
Professor Dean Field stated that patients participating in the Wegovy project generally demonstrate the benefits of medication for the heart. Among the patients participating in these experimental projects, both overweight but not obese individuals and those who did not lose much weight after taking medication were included.
According to detailed research results released by Novo Nordisk in November last year, patients treated with Wegovy injection have a 20% lower risk of heart attack, stroke, and death from cardiovascular disease.
But generally speaking, there is a significant overlap between obese individuals and those with heart disease: according to data from the Caesar Family Foundation, more than a quarter of overweight and obese individuals in the United States also suffer from heart disease among healthcare beneficiaries alone, with approximately 3.6 million people.
In this experiment, researchers found that by the 20th week of the experiment, 62% of participants taking Wegovy had lost more than 5% of their initial weight. More importantly, these patients who have significantly lost weight have a similar decrease in cardiovascular disease risk as those who have lost less than 5% of their weight.
Can more patients use "weight loss pills"?
Dean Field announced the results at the European Congress on Obesity held in Venice. This result means that millions of people may benefit from taking this medication.
He said, "The biggest issue is the cost of health economics, which is the cost of taking early measures as people move towards future diseases... This will be a clear case of doing some upstream work for obesity management."
Dianfield believes that research findings suggest that the benefits of Wegovy for the heart are not just a result of weight loss. He is not sure what the exact cause is, but he believes that one of the reasons may be a decrease in inflammation.
He said, "When you look not only at how much people eat, but also at what they eat, you will find that their diet has completely changed. When you take such drugs, there are various subtle changes that may affect the results, which we were not aware of before."
Martin Holst Lange, the research director of Novo Nordisk, believes that the main driving factors for this benefit are weight loss, anti-inflammatory, and blood pressure lowering. But this pharmaceutical company is also studying other factors, including their impact on specific proteins. Lange said, "We have other analyses indicating that weight loss does have some significance, but it does not mean everything."
Donna Ryan, emeritus professor at the Pennington Biomedical Research Center in Louisiana, helped lead the experiment.
He stated that unlike previous Wegovy weight loss studies, the doctors conducting this Select trial have more room for experimentation, such as allowing patients to continue taking lower doses of medication or suspending treatment in the event of side effects, which better reflects the true treatment scenario.