While millions of Americans could greatly benefit from using weight loss drugs to combat health issues such as obesity, diabetes, and heart disease; they cost too much for most people to afford, and not all health insurance plans cover them.

In addition, there are different kinds of weight loss drugs going by different brand names, and while they can all help you lose weight; they don't work in exactly the same way, and some are more effective than others.

That's why researchers at the Cleveland Clinic's Center for Value Based Care Research, have been studying weight loss drugs since 2015, according to Dr. Hamlet Gasoyan, who  talked to Jeanne Destro recently about results they published recently in JAMA Network Open.

The drugs they studied were Semaglutide (sold under the brand names Wegovy and Ozempic) and Liraglutide (sold under the brand names Saxenda and Victoza), which help lower blood sugar levels and promote weight loss.

According to Gasoyan, in patients with obesity who were prescribed semaglutide or liraglutide, they found that long-term weight reduction varied significantly based on the medication’s active agent, treatment indication, dosage and persistence with the medication.

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Hamlet Gasoyan, PhD., Cleveland Clinic