Aussies face plateaus on weight loss drugs: ‘I ended up not losing as much as hoped’

People who have struggled with their weight have found relief with a new drug. But then their weight loss ground to a halt.

A drug has offered Courtney Dobusch, who has struggled with her weight since childhood, new hope.

But after several months on weight loss medication Wegovy, the 42-year-old reached a plateau — and she is not alone.

After trying various diets and years of her weight fluctuating, the Penrith mum underwent gastric sleeve surgery in 2018.

Her weight dropped from 118kg to about 79kg – but eventually crept back up to 91kg.

“I ended up not losing as much as I’d hoped to lose,” she said.

Ms Dobusch said she spoke to her doctor last year, and after learning early menopause was making it even harder to shift kilos, was prescribed Wegovy.

Courtney Dobusch at her heaviest, before gastric sleeve surgery.

Wegovy is a semaglutide approved specifically for chronic weight management.

Ms Dobusch said the weekly injection cost her about $100 per week.

“You don’t think about food, which seems to be something that a lot of overweight people do – we just think about food all the time,” Ms Dobusch said.

“I did find that it cancelled that noise out, which was just the biggest thing for me.”

She is now about 87kg, and while she considers her overall experience with the medication “really positive”, said the plateau had been “tricky”.

The drug was a tool, rather than a quick fix, she said.

Courtney Dobusch in recent times. Picture: Supplied

Ms Dobusch, who owns a cosmetic clinic, has started pilates in a bid to reignite weight loss.

She said she would also consider using another medicine alongside Wegovy in a bid to accelerate shedding weight.

Nicole started Wegovy when she was unable to obtain Ozempic amid the shortage of the drug, which is used for diabetes.

But the 51-year-old has also experienced a plateau in weight loss.

“When I got to my late 30s I went through a divorce and I put weight on,” she said.

“It was in the mid-2010s I thought ‘I’m going to lose it’, so I did weight training six days a week.”

But she no longer had time or energy for this and following menopause, she turned to weight loss drugs.

She has dropped to 110kg from 124kg, but wants to reach a goal weight of 80kg.

Royal Australian College of General Practitioners chair of obesity management Terri-Lynne South said generally the greatest weight loss occurred in the first six months on Wegovy and “everyone” would plateau.

“I think the expectations of patients may be different from what GPs would know understanding the research,” Dr South said.

“People comparing kilograms lost (rather than body weight percentage) can really do themselves a disservice.”

Dr South said there was variability in how people responded to medications, and individuals’ dosages could also impact results.

She said she believed there was optimism around Wegovy.

“That’s because there was a difficulty of patients accessing semaglutide in the version under Ozempic and having issues with access and supply,” she said.

However, she noted there were still access and equity issues due to cost.

A spokeswoman for pharmaceutical company Novo Nordisk said it could only comment on the weight loss experienced in the STEP-1 clinical trial, in which 86.4 per cent of patients achieved greater than or equal to 5 per cent of weight loss over the 68-week trial period.

“All incretin-based therapies have a plateau effect at a certain point and as with all weight management therapies, the individual patient experience can be widely varied and is influenced by a multitude of factors,” she said.

“Novo Nordisk recommends that all patients speak to their healthcare professional about treatments for chronic weight management particularly in conjunction with other medicines.”

Danish drugmaker Novo Nordisk makes Wegovy. Photo: Mads Claus Rasmussen / Ritzau Scanpix / AFP

Ms Dobusch said she had received a “very positive” reaction to sharing her journey on social media.

“I know a lot of people don’t necessarily agree with these weight loss drugs,” she said. “However, I question whether or not they’ve ever been obese or fighting those internal demons.

“Honestly, it’s 24 hours (a day) in the head.”