Dr. Terry Dubrow gave Hollywood’s ongoing Ozempic trend a try.
“I’ve tried it. I thought it was amazing. I … didn’t have that much weight to lose,” the plastic surgeon, 65, exclusively tells Pvnew while promoting Season 8 of his E! reality show, “Botched,” with Dr. Paul Nassif.
“But I wanted to try it because so many of my patients were on it and I wanted to see what it was like when you’re not diabetic and you only have 10-15 pounds to lose,” he continues, adding that he experienced “some side effects” from taking the medication.
Still, Dubrow emphasized that he is a “huge fan” of the popular drug meant for type 2 diabetes patients, but used by many individuals — including a growing roster of celebrities — for weight loss.
“I think it’s a miracle,” he says. “The biggest breakthrough in medical history.”
Still, an accelerated slim-down wasn’t worth the “low-grade nausea” Dubrow felt or, more importantly, an acute disinterest in food.
“I thought, ‘You know what, I kind of want to get my appetite back. The holidays are coming, I want to enjoy myself,’” he says of his reason for quitting.
“You go on vacation, maybe you don’t exercise, you eat too much,” the medical professional elaborates. “It was kind of like, ‘Well, I want to go on a food vacation,’ meaning I want to be able to eat again.”
Ozempic, an FDA-approved prescription drug, is one of the brand names for semaglutide — also known as Wegovy — which impacts the brain to maintain satiety and suppress one’s appetite.
Dubrow confirms that the medication killed his appetite and “really took … all the joy of eating away.”
The doc — who is married to champagne enthusiast and “Real Housewives of Orange County” star Heather Dubrow — warns current and future users to stay away from alcohol.
“You can’t drink on it,” he asserts, acknowledging the reported danger of developing pancreatitis for those taking Ozempic while also imbibing.
“You’ve got to be really careful with alcohol because people are being put in the hospital with pancreatitis.”
Terry’s co-star, Nassif, 61, believes that Ozempic has properties that could eventually lead to “living longer,” but notes that he’s seen an uptick in plastic surgery patients wanting him to operate on sagging skin due to rapid weight loss.
“Your skin does not accommodate, so it hangs,” he says of what he calls “Ozempic body and face.”
“Then you lose muscle, you’re not taking enough protein and then they’ve got a lot of hanging skin.”
Terry has also treated this issue in his practice. “For patients who want to try [Ozempic], you have to realize your skin is going to loosen up a lot faster,” he explains. “You are going to lose lean muscle mass. You have to increase your protein, you have to work out.”
On “Botched” Season 8, the duo addresses much more complex matters.
For instance, on Thursday’s episode, viewers saw Terry and Nassif help a young woman who risked losing her left eye after 42 botched surgery attempts to repair her face following a tragic car accident when she was a teenager. They also lent their surgical skills to a patient who got a boob job after massive weight loss but was left with mismatched breasts.
“When you’re on a TV show for a decade where all you’re doing is difficult cases, that becomes your whole practice in real life,” Terry says, describing the rare nature of his and Nassif’s careers in medicine.
“We have a skill set now that allows us to fix these incredibly difficult cases,” he enthuses. “What was formerly hard is now easy, and what was formerly impossible is actually mostly possible now.”
“Botched” airs Thursdays at 10 p.m. ET on E!
