My wife has terrible arthritis, in many parts of her body. She recently had a shoulder replacement to deal with what the surgeon called “end stage arthritis” in that shoulder. There are other joints that have serious arthritis although not quite that bad: the other shoulder, one knee, both wrists, several finger joints, etc. A couple of months ago she started taking wegovy (semaglutide) pills for weight loss. She has been delighted to discover that the wegovy’s anti-inflammatory effects have dramatically reduced the pain in almost all of these joints. Before the wegovy she was reduced to about 10 minutes of walking before the knee pain got too much; yesterday we walked for 40 minutes and she said her knee didn’t bother her at all. She also says that her wrists and fingers also hardly hurt at all any more.
Although I’d heard that wegovy has anti-inflammatory effects, we are both pleasantly surprised at how dramatic the effect has been for her. Has anyone else experienced such effects from the new weight loss drugs?
I started taking it for weight loss, but have not noticed any significant anti-inflammatory effects (was on 1.5mg for a month, just started 4mg). I still hurt all over and rely on ibuprofen.
What kind of arthritis is it? Osteo or rheumatoid or psoriatic?
I’m on Mounjaro and have not noticed any anti-inflammatory effect (lowest and 2nd-lowest doses) on my osteoarthritis. Of course, this is a different iteration of that type of medicine, so the difference may be telling.
Osteo. Mostly the smaller joints, fingers and toes. I’ve also been fighting a frozen shoulder for almost two years that’s finally at about 98% of normal.