WEDNESDAY, March 12, 2025 (HealthDay News) — Neoadjuvant semaglutide before metabolic and bariatric surgery (MBS) is not beneficial in terms of weight loss, according to a research letter published online March 5 in JAMA Surgery.

Vasundhara Mathur, M.D., from Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, and colleagues conducted a retrospective cohort study to examine the long-term outcomes of neoadjuvant semaglutide before MBS. Patients who received semaglutide before MBS from 2017 to 2024 were matched 1:1 with patients who did not receive semaglutide before MBS using nearest-neighbor propensity score matching (182 patients and 182 controls).

The researchers found that at postoperative months 6, 9, and 12, total weight loss (TWL) was lower for patients who received preoperative semaglutide than controls (median 12-month TWL: 21.0 versus 26.0 percent). For patients who received semaglutide, combined multimodality TWL was higher at postoperative month 3 but did not differ thereafter. Patients receiving preoperative semaglutide versus controls had similar median hemoglobin A1c levels before MBS and one year after MBS. Furthermore, both cohorts had a similar number of patients with diabetes remission at postoperative year 1. Early major postoperative complications did not differ significantly across cohorts.

“This study showed neoadjuvant semaglutide did not confer benefits for weight loss, diabetes remission, or MBS safety,” the authors write.

Several authors disclosed ties to the biopharmaceutical industry; one author has three patents pending.

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