Source desk · Evidence and cautions
An evidence sheet for a peptide offer.
Match a treatment claim to a named study. Ask whether that study addresses your goal and the product being proposed.
Ask for the proposed medicine’s exact name, the result being claimed and the evidence for that result.
Compare the study with the offer.Check whether the study used the same medicine and asked about the result you want.
What did the weight study show?
STEP 1 studied adults with obesity, or excess weight plus a weight-related condition, who did not have diabetes.
The comparison group had a dummy shot: an injection with none of the study medicine in it.
After 68 weeks, the dummy-shot group had lost 2.4% of its starting weight on average; semaglutide’s group averaged 14.9%.
Both groups also received help with food and activity.
Novo Nordisk, the drug’s maker, funded the study; the averages cannot predict any one person’s result.
Read the weight trial behind those figures
The paper describes who took part and the help they received.
Trial report in the medical journal recordA weight result does not answer every hormone question. Ask for evidence about the goal on your own sheet.
Did the trial settle what happens after stopping?
A year after treatment ended, the STEP 1 follow-up group had put back roughly two-thirds of its earlier weight loss.
Read the follow-up report
Ask how long any proposed plan would run and how you could review it with the prescriber.
Published follow-up after treatment withdrawalWhat if a pharmacy makes it to order?
A pharmacy making a medicine for a particular need is doing what is called compounding.
FDA is short for the US Food and Drug Administration.
FDA approval was absent for these compounded medicines on September 26, 2026. Before sale, the agency had not reviewed their safety, how they worked or the way they were made.
The FDA keeps a list for medicines whose supply is short across the country. Semaglutide injections had no entry on that list on September 26, 2026. That removed the former shortage reason for pharmacies to keep making copies of these injections as a routine service.
A pharmacy could not routinely make near-copies of medicines already available to buy, under the rule recorded on September 26, 2026. A version changed for a named patient could be treated differently. The prescriber had to decide that the change made a significant difference for that patient.
Check the compounding limits
Compounding has a role, but a lower price alone does not answer the question about a particular preparation.
FDA explanation of compounded preparationsFDA account of shortage and copy policiesAsk what the pharmacy would change in the medicine, why you need that change, and which prescriber will put the reason in writing.
Which sales claims call for a pause?
FDA advice checked September 17, 2026 flags offers without screening and a prescription, or without a doctor available for later questions.
The FDA’s position recorded on September 26, 2026 rejects calling a compounded medicine approved. It also rejects claims that studies in patients prove it gives the same result as the approved drug.
The FDA also urged people to avoid products labelled for research but offered for people to take, as of September 26, 2026. Their quality was unknown and they could cause harm.
Read the agency’s cautions about offers
Compare the wording in the offer with what the agency says. Keep questions about the product separate from questions about the service.
FDA advice on weight-medicine offersFDA guidance on claims about compoundingWhat could go wrong?
In the semaglutide (Wegovy) injection weight trials, nausea, or feeling sick, affected 44% on the medicine and 16% on the dummy injection.
Those same trials also reported frequent constipation, vomiting and diarrhea.
The label’s strongest alert, called a boxed warning, concerns thyroid tumors: abnormal growths whose signs can include a lump in the neck. These tumors occurred in rats and mice; whether semaglutide causes them in people remains unknown.
The label names a rare kind of thyroid cancer, medullary thyroid cancer. It rules semaglutide out for anyone who has had it, or has a family history of that specific cancer.
The label also calls this cancer medullary thyroid carcinoma, shortened to MTC.
Ask the prescriber to check the exact cancer name in family medical records. Saying that a relative had cancer does not answer which kind.
The label also rules out use with MEN 2, a rare illness passed down through families.
If a family illness was called something else, ask the prescriber to check the records against the name MEN 2.
Keep this question open until the name has been checked.
A previous serious allergic reaction to semaglutide or an added ingredient also rules out use in the labels.
For a planned pregnancy, the Wegovy label asks prescribers to end treatment two months or more in advance.
Semaglutide slows the stomach’s emptying. The label warns that food left there can reach the lungs during surgery with drugs that cause sleep or deep drowsiness.
Ask the team doing the operation to review the medicine with you. Ask them how to prepare, including what to do about the medicine.
Open the label behind these points
These points come from the semaglutide product label. Take the questions that relate to you to the prescriber.
Wegovy semaglutide label, including patient informationA severe allergic reaction needs emergency care, according to MedlinePlus; signs can include trouble breathing or swelling of the tongue.
Read the emergency information
MedlinePlus describes severe symptoms and getting emergency help.
MedlinePlus on a severe allergic reactionNothing in these boxes is sent anywhere. Copy the notes you want to keep before opening another sheet.
Keep the unanswered points together for your visit.
Return to your question list