At MFC, we first became interested in weight loss injections when we began getting enquiries from women in midlife who were either on the injections, or had recently stopped using them.

We had in-depth conversations with women and we heard reports of:

1. Rapid weight loss that lead to feeling weak and deconditioned. 
2. Rapid changes in body composition, that is – loss of body fat and muscle – leaving women with excess baggy skin. 
3. Rebound weight gain after stopping the injections, in some cases as the side effects were too difficult to manage.

This will be a tiny proportion of users and is in no way representative – we don’t hear from the many women who have had brilliant results. 

GLP-1 receptor agonists, like Mounjaro and Ozempic create an amazing window of opportunity when used in the right way, but they might not solve the problem in the long term. These conversations with prospective clients opened our eyes to the role of supportive, lifestyle interventions that need to go hand-in-hand with weight loss injection therapy. To paraphrase a colleague:

“When you start weight loss injections, it’s like riding a bike with stabilisers.  The stabilisers are the injections, the bike is lifelong nutrition and exercise strategies, and you are pedalling away in charge of both.  The stabilisers (injections) create a window of opportunity for you to learn to ride a bike (implement nutrition and exercise) safely and effectively, but you can’t use stabilisers forever.  Once the injections are gone, you’ll need to be able to maintain your lifelong healthy habits.”

This isn’t about skinny celebrities, this is about improving the metabolic health and the quality of life of people who live with obesity. We firmly believe that the right support should be available to people and that treatment protocols should be optimised to achieve the best long-term outcomes.

What does the research tell us?

The availability of weight loss injections has increased tremendously over the last 12 months. This is an evolving area of research and long-term data is lacking.

One paper that stood out is from Jensen et al 2025. In this study adults with obesity were randomly assigned to one of four groups (1) placebo injection, 2) exercise + placebo injection, 3) weight loss injection, or 4) weight loss injection + exercise). 

Researchers tested the hypothesis that weight loss and body composition were preserved better when exercise and weight loss injections were combined, rather than just weight loss injections.

The results showed that more participants who had received combination (injection + exercise) treatment maintained a weight loss of at least 10% of initial body weight one year after treatment, compared with participants who had received injection alone or placebo. 

Weight regain one-year after treatment was 6kg more for participants who had received injections compared with those who had received injection + exercise combination treatment.

Authors concluded that the addition of supervised exercise during weight loss injection therapy improves the maintenance of healthy body weight and body composition after treatment finishes.

A turning point

We have taken this onboard; we have created a supported exercise and nutrition programme for women in midlife using weight loss injections.  This directly applies evidence that exercise and nutrition strategies can help to preserve muscle mass and reduce the chances of rebound weight gain.

In the next blog, we’ll introduce Turning Point – our online exercise and nutrition coaching package for women in midlife using weight loss injections.