Ozempic Patients Report Another Troubling Side Effect: “I’ve Lost at Least Half My Hair”

GLP-1 medications like Ozempic, Wegovy, and Mounjaro are approved to either treat type 2 diabetes or obesity. By stabilizing your blood sugar and helping you reach a healthy weight, these drugs, in turn, reduce your risk of developing heart disease, osteoarthritis, and even certain types of cancer.

However, there’s the cosmetic side, too. Shedding pounds can undoubtedly improve someone’s self-esteem. Some people even use weight-loss drugs when they weren’t clinically obese to begin with. But a new Ozempic side effect has come to light, and it’s having the exact opposite effect on patients’ appearance.

RELATED: Doctors Warn That Drugs Like Ozempic Are Making You “Skinny Fat.”

People claim weight-loss drugs are making their hair fall out.

There are countless videos on TikTok and threads on Reddit with Ozempic patients complaining about severe hair loss.

In one Reddit posting, an Ozempic user shares how the drug helped her drop 97 pounds and stabilize her blood sugar in one year. However, she says, “I’ve lost at least half my hair. And it shows no signs of stopping.”

Her doctor conducted a full physical to figure out the hair loss, but all her results were normal. “I am terrified of gaining weight back if I stop taking Ozempic,” she admitted. “But my hair loss is REALLY affecting me and contributing to my depression.”

Another Ozempic user responded, “My hair loss started at about the 6 month mark. I have to now use kid size hair ties wrapped three times because it’s so thin.”

“I’ve been on it for about 6 months and my hair is in terrible shape. Breaking all over even with regular trims. It feels dry and damaged and I’ve always had thick, healthy hair,” someone else shared. “I am stopping it because if it’s doing this much damage to my hair (literally killing it from the inside out) I can’t imagine what it’s doing to my body.”

RELATED: Ozempic and Mounjaro Patients Report Potentially Fatal New Side Effect.

Doctors say the hair loss is likely due to rapid weight loss, not the drugs themselves.

In speaking with The Cut, Jodi LoGerfo, DNP, a nurse practitioner and hair-loss specialist, points to telogen effluvium (TE) as the cause of Ozempic-related hair loss.

“Telogen effluvium is a common type of hair loss that affects people after they experience severe stress or a change to their body,” explains Cleveland Clinic. “Symptoms include thinning hair, usually around the top of your head.”

LoGerfo says telogen effluvium can be brought on by surgery, illness, stress, nutritional deficiencies, hormonal changes, or rapid weight loss.

“Normally, only about 10 percent of hair follicles are in the telogen phase,” LoGerfo notes, referring to the point in the hair-growth cycle when a hair follicle is inactive and eventually sheds a hair. “But during TE, that can jump to 40 percent,” she says.

In a TikTok video, board-certified dermatologist Samantha Ellis, MD, shares that many of her hair-loss patients are taking GLP-1 medications.

“Even without being on a weight-loss drug, if you rapidly lose a lot of weight, it’s really common to shed a lot of hair,” Ellis says.

However, she adds that, in her experience with weight-loss drug patients “once you reach a steady weight for about six months, the hair shedding seems to really decrease.”

Ellis also points out that when you significantly reduce how much you’re eating, there’s a chance you’re not getting the necessary nutrients to maintain healthy hair: “You might be protein deficient, zinc, vitamin D, iron.”

RELATED: Ozempic and Wegovy May Have Landed 25,000 People in the ER—Here’s the Scary Reason Why.

What can you do if you’re experiencing hair loss from taking Ozempic?

If you believe that your hair has started falling out more than normal, the first step is to see your doctor, who can rule out any underlying conditions.

Marisa Garshick, MD, board-certified dermatologist at MDCS Dermatology, tells Vogue that she recommends getting blood work done to see if any hormonal changes or nutritional deficiencies are at play.

She also suggests talking to your doctor about taking an oral hair-growth supplement such as Nutrafol or Wellbel. (Though we can’t speak to their specific medical situations, many Redditors experiencing Ozempic-related hair loss say they turned to Nutrafol.)

As for what you’re eating, endocrinologist Caroline Messer, MD, tells The Cut that protein is key, since hair is made of keratin, a type of protein. She adds that eating foods rich in iron, zinc, and B vitamins is also important.