Ozempic is facing scrutiny for possible eye disease
A box of Novo Nordisk's Ozempic is seen at a pharmacy in London, Britain, March 8, 2024.
Hollie Adams | Reuters
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There may be a new, unintended side effect Novo NordiskThe blockbuster diabetes injection Ozempic.
Danish health authorities said Monday they would ask the European Union's medicines regulator to review the results of two Danish studies linking Ozempic to an increased risk of a rare, vision-threatening eye disease in type 2 diabetes patients.
The condition is called non-arteritic anterior ischemic optic neuropathy, or NAION. It is characterized by loss of vision due to reduced blood flow to the front part of the optic nerve, which connects the eye to the brain.
The disease is typically painless and most commonly affects people aged 50 and over. NAION is estimated to affect between 2.3 and 10.3 patients per 100,000 people in the United States each year.
The Danish Medicines Agency said it had been closely monitoring NAION over the past six months for a possible side effect of semaglutide, the active ingredient in Ozempic. As of December 10, the authority had received 19 reports about the situation in Denmark.
But the total number of NAION cases in Denmark has increased since Ozempic was launched on the Danish market in 2018, said Jakob Grauslund, professor of eye diseases at the University of Southern Denmark (SDU), in a press release on Monday. There used to be about 60 to 70 cases a year in Denmark, but now there are up to 150, added Grauslund, who helped conduct one of the studies.
This is the latest potential concern surrounding popular GLP-1 derivatives like Ozempic, which mimic gut hormones to regulate blood sugar and suppress appetite. Demand for this class of drugs has soared despite high prices and a handful of unpleasant side effects, most commonly occurring in the gastrointestinal tract, such as nausea and vomiting.
In a statement on Monday, Novo Nordisk said that after a “thorough evaluation of the studies” and an internal safety assessment, the Danish drugmaker “is of the opinion that the benefit-risk profile of semaglutide remains unchanged.” The company added that safety Patients have top priority.
The studies, conducted independently by SDU researchers and other institutions, both found that diabetes patients who took Ozempic were more than twice as likely to be diagnosed with the condition as those who took another diabetes drug .
The first Danish study was based on data from more than 400,000 diabetes patients, a quarter of whom were treated with Ozempic and the rest with other diabetes medications. The second study included data from more than 44,000 Danish diabetes patients who received Ozempic between 2018 and 2024 and nearly 17,000 Norwegian patients who took the drug between 2018 and 2022.
The studies were published on medRxiv, a website that publishes studies before they have been reviewed by outside scientists. Both appear to confirm a connection first suggested in a Harvard University study earlier this year.
Still, the authors of the first SDU study said the absolute risk of disease in semaglutide users was low. They added that assuming the risk remains constant over time, the results suggest that a diabetes patient taking Ozempic for 20 years would have a 0.3 to 0.5% chance of developing NAION get sick.
“Although our results do not exclude the possibility of an increased risk of NAION with the use of semaglutide for obesity, the small number of events observed suggests that any potential risk is likely to be of limited absolute magnitude,” the authors of the first study said.
They added that additional, differently designed analyzes are needed to further investigate whether Wegovy users who take semaglutide for obesity also have an increased risk of the disease.
Currently, analysts are less concerned about NAION's risk and its potential to reduce Ozempic prescriptions.
“Unless it is determined that semaglutide is the only GLP-1 receptor that poses this risk [is] “We are unlikely to be impacted,” TD Cowen analyst Michael Nedelcovych said in a research note on Monday.
Feel free to send tips, suggestions, story ideas and data to Annika at annikakim.constantino@nbcuni.com.
The Latest in Health Technology: Nearly 80% of doctors who use telemedicine do so weekly, a study shows
If doctors have their way, telemedicine is here to stay. This is according to a new report from Doximity, which found that 83% of physicians want telemedicine to remain “an ongoing part of their clinical practice.”
Doximity operates a digital platform for medical professionals that is likened to a LinkedIn for doctors. But users can do more than just network and read news on Doximity, as the company also offers telehealth tools like voice and video calling.
With the company having some skin in the game, Doximity released a report on Tuesday outlining the state of telemedicine in the U.S. and its role in healthcare delivery. In August, 1,171 telemedicine users among doctors and 131 telemedicine users among nurses were surveyed.
More than 77% of physicians surveyed said they use telemedicine weekly, and 35% said they have integrated the technology into their daily clinical practice. Nearly 90% of nurses reported using telehealth weekly and 52% do so daily.
“The strong physician support of telemedicine underscores its increasing role in modern healthcare and has the potential to transform the way healthcare is delivered in the coming years,” Doximity said.
Additionally, about two-thirds of physicians said telemedicine in their practices had led to “improved patient outcomes,” particularly among neurologists, endocrinologists and rheumatologists. Doximity found that endocrinologists, urologists, gastroenterologists, rheumatologists and neurologists were the most likely to use the technology.
The most common use of telemedicine in clinical practice is follow-up visits, as 84% of physicians reported using the technology to conduct these appointments. Next, 60% of physicians said they use telemedicine for medication management, 57% said they use it to discuss lab reports or test results with patients, and 52% said they use it to keep patients informed to help manage chronic illnesses.
Half of physicians surveyed said telemedicine had improved patient adherence to treatment plans, compared to 37% last year.
Nearly a third of doctors said the technology helped them see more patients per day, and two-thirds said it helped them treat their patients better.
Read Doximity’s full report here.
Feel free to send tips, suggestions, story ideas and data to Ashley at ashley.caroot@nbcuni.com.
