Today, more than two-thirds of adults in the U.S. are overweight or obese. While there are many treatments for weight loss, Semaglutide® is proving to be one of the most successful.

Semaglutide is similar to a natural hormone called glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1), which is produced in the body after eating a meal. It targets an area in the brain (called GLP-1 receptors) that help to regulate your appetite and how much you eat. Semaglutide is administered once a week by injection. Since the FDA approved it for weight loss in 2021, its popularity has soared. Yet with that, comes considerable misinformation.

Let’s dive into the top five myths:

1. Semaglutide causes persistent nausea, vomiting and diarrhea. Nausea, vomiting and diarrhea may occur when you use Semaglutide. This is dose-dependent and typically occurs when the dosage is advanced too quickly. However, it typically resolves over time. At TruGevity, we’ll manage these symptoms if they occur by adjusting the dosage as needed. Additionally, to mitigate the side effects, we can prescribe nausea medication, like Zofran, to control the symptoms until your body acclimates.

As a doctor working to improve longevity and health span outcomes for my patients, the importance of exercise cannot be ignored.

Sugar is used to make foods sweet and more desirable. Food manufacturers began adding sugar to various foods in the 1970’s. This was in response to the government recommendations to avoid fat, and adopt a low-fat lifestyle. Since fat conveys both flavor and texture, removing fat from food makes it relatively tasteless prompting food manufacturers to add sugar and other carbohydrates to replace the fat. As fat was engineered out of the diet, generations of Americans were weaned to the taste of extra-sweet sugary foods instead.

So how does the excess intake of sugar harm the body? As a simple carbohydrate glucose or sugar is absorbed into the bloodstream soon after ingestion. In response to the increasing glucose levels the pancreas responds by releasing insulin that is responsible for facilitating the transport of glucose into the cell.

Individuals that eat foods containing significant sugar content, frequently throughout the day, will have a persistent elevation of both glucose and insulin in their bloodstream which are associated with:

As a doctor working to improve longevity and health span outcomes for my patients, the importance of exercise cannot be ignored.

Exercise is not just important for overall health and vitality, but it can also prevent disease. Evaluation of patient demographics participating in moderate exercise has concluded that regular exercise can decrease all cancer by 23%, and cardiovascular disease by 30%, with an all-cause mortality reduction of 25%. In this retrospective analysis, moderate exercise is defined as 50 minutes once weekly or 10-20 minutes 3 times/week.

Resistance training is an integral part of exercising. Increasing muscle mass has many benefits associated with longevity. Increased muscle mass increases the body's metabolic activity which not only burns more calories at rest, it also assists in controlling glucose and insulin levels, which affects our health. People with low muscle mass have a 200 times greater all-risk mortality when compared to a high muscle mass individual.

Exercise has also been shown to slow down the aging process. Researchers have identified several parameters that can be measured that are indicators of biological age. These index tests available to the public are the Horvath Clock or DNA methylation Clock. The exciting news is that we can monitor the effect that lifestyle modifications have on our biological age. I recommend any activity that you enjoy just to get started. In time, as you notice the benefits, additional activities may be added to enhance your success.

Over the past few years, there have been many published clinical trials that have identified the benefits of time-restricted eating.

In a recent New England Journal of Medicine article, 32(2033), the authors identified several benefits derived from fasting:

• Increased autophagy or the elimination of dysfunctional and senescence cells, and facilitates cellular repair in the body. Increasing autophagy has been associated with decreasing blood pressure and fighting disease.

• Reduction in cytokines which reduces inflammation in the body. Chronic inflammation damages healthy cells, tissues, and organs. Over time, this can lead to DNA damage, tissue death, and internal scarring.

• Animal studies have demonstrated that animals with time-restricted eating, on average, live 30% longer. Interestingly, in some studies, the animals consumed nearly the same number of calories during the feeding window compared to the other animals that were allowed to eat whenever they wanted. Yet, the longevity benefits persisted.

• Keeping the blood sugar and insulin level low during fasting can result in the activation of a group of hormones called Sirtuins. This group of hormones are actively engaged in cellular repair and maintenance. Additionally, during fasting, with decreased protein intake, the mTor pathway is suppressed. This is beneficial as elevated mTor is associated with shortened life span, cancer, and many other chronic health conditions.

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