GLP-1 discontinuation: weight regain trajectory and mitigation strategies — anyone have experience?

JennaRN said:

One third of STEP 4 participants held most of their loss without the drug, and nobody has convincingly characterised who they are.

The regain framing needs pushing back on. Two thirds regained means one third did not, and the trial provided no ongoing support to either group. Treating regain as pharmacologically inevitable is as unsupported as treating maintenance as automatic.

KristenIndy said:

I am eight weeks into deliberately reducing rather than stopping, and the appetite change came back faster than the weight did.

STEP 5 long-term data on maintenance dosing: the 104-week (2-year) extension showed sustained weight loss of -15.2% with continued semaglutide vs weight regain in the discontinuation group[1].

Key insight: weight loss continued to accrue between weeks 68 and 104 in many patients, suggesting the nadir may not occur until year 2+. The 68-week primary endpoint in most trials may underestimate maximal efficacy.

This supports long-term, open-ended treatment rather than fixed-duration "courses" of therapy.

BethLabQueen said:

The regain framing needs pushing back on.

BethLabQueen said:

...I stopped maintenance dosing and regained all the weight...

This is a really important data point and I appreciate your honesty. The STEP 1 extension data showed ~2/3 of weight regain within 12 months of discontinuation.

This doesn't mean the drug "doesn't work" — it means obesity is a chronic disease requiring ongoing treatment, just like hypertension or diabetes. We don't criticize blood pressure meds for "not working" when BP rises after stopping them.

The framing matters. maintenance dosing is a treatment, not a cure. And that's okay.

A narrower follow-up, since the general answer is now clear:

Whether extending the interval works as well as reducing the dose, since they are not the same intervention pharmacologically?

OP back with an update, since a thread like this is useless without one.

I went to a lower dose rather than a longer interval on the strength of the trough argument in this thread, and the difference in how even it feels is obvious.