Microdosing GLP-1 drugs became a longevity 'craze' | Hacker News Reader

Microdosing GLP-1 drugs became a longevity 'craze'

washingtonpost.com

26 pointspaulpauper11 comments

>She drew up a syringe of the GLP-1 drug tirzepatide in June that was just 40 percent of the standard starting dose. The side effects she’d felt — constipation and extreme fatigue — went away with the smaller shot, she said, while her blood pressure, joint pain and inflammation improved.

40% doesn't seem "microdose" to me. If 100% is very effective as it seems right now, 40% should be reasonably effective assuming a somewhat linear dose response curve.

Further blood pressure and weight loss can be easily measured, so I'm not sure why it would be so hard to control the dosage yourself, with the doctors setting a maximum dose instead. It doesn't seem unreasonable at all.

Compare for example to doctors prescribing insane amounts of stimulants to ADHD patients in the past, which they've now scaled back. It's maybe sometimes better to just start with less and see if your symptoms improve.

Antibiotics have to be exactly administered to avoid creating immune bacteria. Many other medications I don't see that danger. Actually it seems more dangerous to use a high dose right away that causes issues for many patients.

A microdose would be like 0.1% -1% of standard dose She just did half, not micro

It's 40% of the _starter dose_ (2.5 mg), which is what patients begin taking to get their bodies accustomed to the drug. The "maintenance dose" that patients build up to can be many times higher (10-15 mg).

40% of the starter dose (40% of 2.5mg = 1mg) would be between 6-10% of the "maintenance dose" (betweeen 10-15mg).

https://archive.is/DADtP

I saw a stat that 1 in 8 Americans have taken GLP-1s. 1 in 8!! And that was from May 2024 so it's probably higher now.

https://www.kff.org/health-costs/poll-1-in-8-adults-say-they...

If we consider that roughly 73.6% of Americans are overweight[0], perhaps there would be some benefit if substantially more people started taking GLP-1 medications.

[0]: https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/obesity-overweight.htm

i think we'll soon see some very safe OTC version of GLP-1 just added to the food and drinks just like salt and sugar are added. That will allow for example Coke drinkers to drink it back again a lot.

This makes no sense .. the drugs work by making you not want to consume stuff.

That would be a good addition to food from the public health view. From the food producers point of view i think they would find some version which doesn't have effect of decreasing consumption, yet would prevent the gross obesity result from increased consumption, a "diet" like versions without it actually being a diet ones.

A bit of a tangent, but that’s also roughly the number of americans that have worked at mcdonald’s

https://mcdonalds1in8.com/

This is a very funny comment. Thank you.

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