What is Mysimba?

What is Mysimba used for?

Mysimba is a weight loss medication used in patients who are classed as obese alongside diet and exercise to help aid weight loss. It is a prescription medication and must be prescribed by a registered professional.

How does Mysimba work?

Mysimba is a prescription-only weight loss drug with two key ingredients, naltrexone and bupropion. Mysimba comes in tablet form with patients usually taking 1-2 a day, with a limit of 4 per day. The tablets work by reducing your appetite so that you are satisfied eating less, the active ingredients are also thought to curb cravings, reducing the desire to eat and making weight loss more achievable. Mysimba is used to treat those with an overweight BMI of 30 or more.

How effective is Mysimba?

For a medication to be licensed for sale, there is a thorough and rigorous amount of testing which must take place. Data published for the public by The European Medicines Agency explains that Mysimba was proven to be effective in reducing body weight in 4 main studies involving approximately 4500 obese or overweight patients. Patients in the studies were given the drug or a placebo in combination with a weight loss program involving counseling and advice on diet and exercise.

The European Medicines Agency goes on to explain:

"In three of the studies, the average weight loss in patients treated with Mysimba was around 3.7 to 5.7%, compared with 1.3 to 1.9% with placebo; the proportion of Mysimba-treated patients who achieved 5% weight loss ranged from 28 to 42% compared with 12 to 14% with placebo. About 13 to 22% of those taking Mysimba achieved at least a 10% reduction in weight, while 5 to 6% of placebo-treated patients did so.

In the other study, in which patient counseling was also more intensive, the overall weight loss was greater over the study period: 8.1% with Mysimba and 4.9% with placebo. Some 46% and 30% of patients given Mysimba achieved 5 and 10% weight reductions respectively, compared with 34% and 17% respectively with placebo.

The degree of improvement with Mysimba over placebo was similar using different methods of analysis, although the benefits were smallest with the most conservative methods that assumed patients who did not complete the study would not have seen any improvement. The treatment effect was more marked in patients who completed 56 weeks of treatment, or who had lost at least 5% of their original body weight by 4 months." A full reference can be found here.

Is Mysimba available on the NHS?

Unfortunately, despite being proven as an effective weight loss drug that was approved for use in Europe in 2015, Mysimba is not licensed for this use via the NHS. Mysimba remains available for weight loss treatment via private prescription.

How to order Mysimba:

Here at PrivateDoc, your weight loss is our priority. That’s why we make it really simple for you to get in touch and get the right treatment for you. All you need to do is press 'Get Started' and follow the online consultation steps, one of our team will then be in touch to advise of your prescription and get you started.