A popular obesity drug may help treat a dangerous disorder in which people struggle to breathe while they sleep, a new study finds.
Tirzepatide, the medication in the weight loss drug Zepbound and also the diabetes treatment Mounjaro, appeared to reduce the severity of sleep apnea along with reducing weight and improving blood pressure and other health measures in patients with obesity who took the drug for a year.
Eli Lilly and Co., the drug’s maker who paid for the research, has asked the Food and Drug Administration to expand use of the drug to treat moderate to severe sleep apnea, in which people stop and start breathing during sleep, a spokesperson said Friday. A decision is expected by the end of the year.
But an outside expert cautioned in an editorial that more research will be needed to tell if the drug can be used as “a sole treatment” for obstructive sleep apnea, which occurs when tissue in the throat relaxes and collapses during sleep, fully or partially blocking the airway. It affects an estimated 20 million Americans and can cause short-term issues such as snoring, brain fog and daytime sleepiness but also severe long-term issues such as heart disease, dementia and early death.
It’ll be I interesting going forward. I’ve been on Wegovy since October, and have lost about 50lbs or ~15% of my body weight. I wonder if my insurance will continue to pay for if it can help me get all the way down to a healthy weight…
As I understand it, these drugs are more or less designed to be taken forever or you’re likely to gain the weight back. What good is all this doing if I have to cease the medication if I can get to a “healthy weight”?
So my insurance currently covers a lifetime benefit of like $20k or something for these meds. I used to be on Saxenda, but I couldn’t get it filled and the weight came right back.
However, I actually started gaining weight before I stopped taking it - because some big stressors re triggered my poor eating habits. Had that not occurred, and I was able to continue to lose weight and not sought out my poor habits before, I think it would have been significantly easier to keep the weight off.
That being said, I think insurance companies are trying to delay as much as they can for these drugs to go generic. They currently just cost way too fucking much for something that can benefit most Americans because of shit eating habits.
On another note: my sleep apnea didn’t go away as I lost weight. I was very disappointed.
I never considered there might be a lifetime limit to my benefit…