Wellness Wednesday: Medication-Assisted Weight Loss

When it comes to weight loss, sometimes lifestyle changes alone may not be enough in your weight loss journey.

Joining the News 9 team Wednesday morning to share more about weight loss medication is Dr. Nikki Rodriguez from Norman Regional.

Q: The biggest medication that we always hear about is maybe Ozempic or some of those shots, what should people know about that?

A: "There's a lot of people who are candidates for it," Rodriguez said. "We look at the strict FDA criteria, so anybody with a BMI of 27 and over, with a weight-related co-morbidity, it can be pre-diabetes, a thyroid disorder, hypertension, high cholesterol. Then we look at anybody who has a BMI of 30 and over, regardless of comorbidity, and an interesting group would be children as well. So some of these weight loss medications are approved as young as 12 and over."

Q: What are you looking for in a patient that comes in?

A: "They come from different sources, so some of them come from their primary care," Rodriguez said. "Some come because they don't need a referral, so they can come and see me, but basically, anybody who wants to have better health, I think it's more than just weight loss. It's just a lifestyle change, they're ready to lose extra weight because their joints hurt, their back hurts, they can't do as much, or maybe they had a weight-related condition. So say, they were recently pregnant, and then they have a lot of the baby weight they haven't been able to lose."

Q: There are a lot of different medications out there, what are some of your options?

A: "A lot of it is insurance-driven as well because these weight loss medications are sometimes not approved by the insurance if you don't have them in your insurance plan," Rodriguez said. "There's other options because there's a world of what we call compounding these medications as well. But in general, these medications are generally going to be okay for everybody, because they're relatively very safe."

Q: Is price an issue often, too?

A: "These medications can be very expensive if they're not covered by insurance," Rodriguez said. "So we look at them being about $1,200 on average per month, but there are some coupons online."