What Is It?
Appetite Suppressants
It’s normal to feel hungry. It’s your body’s telling you it’s time to fuel up. But if you find yourself craving food even though you just ate, there’s a good chance you’ll gain weight. Can appetite suppressants help?
Do Appetite Suppressants Work?
Yes, but probably not as much as you might hope. A review of studies on five major FDA-approved prescription medications for obesity, including orlistat, shows that any of them work better than a placebo for helping people lose at least 5% of their body weight over a year. Phentermine-topiramate and liraglutide had the highest odds of making that happen.
Appetite suppressants are drugs that make you feel full, suppressing your appetite. Appetite suppressants (also known as diet pills) trigger hormonal responses that interrupt the brain’s signals, telling you that you feel hungry and that it’s time to eat.
They can also make you feel full more quickly once you begin to eat. This means, in theory, that you eat less and therefore lose weight.
Appetite suppressants may help to suppress hunger and cause you to feel full sooner, so they might help you lose weight in the short term. However, there are safer ways to lose weight.