Tirzepatide Benefits | Clinical Trials

Writer： admin Time：2025-06-13 11:17 Browse：℃

While tirzepatide has already been approved as a safe and effective treatment of type 2 diabetes, researchers are now intrigued by its potential weight loss and cardioprotective benefits.

Clinical trials to investigate these uses are ongoing until at least 2024. Accordingly, we will summarize only the results published as of the date of writing.

 Tirzepatide and Weight Loss: 

The ability of tirzepatide to induce weight loss is at least partially explained by its mechanism of activating GIP receptors in fat cells, resulting in decreased adipose inflammation and increased adiponectin, both associated with reduced fat cell differentiation and increased energy expenditure.

In view of the global obesity crisis and the fairly limited treatment options on the market, Eli Lilly and Company, as tirzepatide patent holder, kicked off a clinical development program to test tirzepatide as a weight control agent in late 2022. Called SURMOUNT, the program is set to include four global phase 3 trials to evaluate tirzepatide’s safety and efficacy as an adjunct weight loss treatment in obese and overweight adults, defined as those with a BMI of ≥ 27.

The first trial numbered over 2,500 participants and confirmed the peptide’s efficacy in inducing weight loss in obese and overweight patients. Study authors observed average weight reductions of 16% for patients on tirzepatide 5mg/weekly, 21.4% for tirzepatide 10mg/weekly, and 22.5% for tirzepatide 15mg/weekly, over the course of 72 weeks. The remaining trials are set to conclude in 2023 .

 Tirzepatide as a T2D Treatment: BAs discussed, tirzepatide’s dual GLP-1/GLP action sets it apart as a T2D treatment

Researchers believe that its unique mechanism of action, summarized as mimicking native GIP at the GIP receptor while exhibiting bias at the GLP-1 receptor for cAMP generation over beta-arrestin recruitment, underlies its efficacy as an anti-diabetes drug.

Research has shown that tirzepatide is superior to other diabetes therapies like semaglutide and dulaglutide in terms of glycemic control and weight loss. For example, researchers discovered that tirzepatide was more effective than semaglutide at lowering hemoglobin A1c and causing weight loss in T2D patients.

On the basis of its comparative effectiveness, the USFDA has approved tirzepatide as an adjunct treatment for improving blood sugar control in adults with T2D, as an addition to doctor-supervised diet and exercise .

 Tirzepatide and Cardioprotective Benefits: Research surrounding GLP-1 shows that the incretin hormone is key to directly regulating risk factors like hypertension and obesity, while indirectly regulating risk factors like inflammation and endothelial cell dysfunction. It is thus believed that tirzepatide’s selective targeting of the GLP-1 receptor may slow the development and progression of cardiovascular complications, particularly in diabetic patients .

In a 26-week study on T2D patients, once-weekly tirzepatide injections improved lipoprotein biomarkers associated with insulin resistance and cardiovascular risk, while reducing triglycerides, suggesting a net lowering of the patients’ risk of heart disease.

A pending cardiovascular outcomes study should provide a more accurate picture of the cardioprotective benefits of tirzepatide, pitting it against the GLP-1 receptor agonist dulaglutide .