➡️ ☹️ 5th dose being removed from kwikpens

[WeAllHaveWings]

If I am reading this right (will be pleased if anyone can tell me I am not!). There might be further changes meaning the amount of medication in kwikpens is being reduced from 3ml to 2.4ml. No more 5th doses ☹️

Original -

<a class="break-all" href="https://web.archive.org/web/20250501154022/www.medicines.org.uk/emc/product/15484/smpc" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://web.archive.org/web/20250501154022/www.medicines.org.uk/emc/product/15484/smpc

6.5 Nature and contents of container
Mounjaro 2.5 mg KwikPen solution for injection in pre‑filled pen
Each pre-filled KwikPen contains 3 ml of solution.
Each pre-filled KwikPen contains 12.5 mg of tirzepatide in 3 ml solution.
Each pre-filled KwikPen contains 2.4 ml of solution that can be administered.
Pack sizes of 1 and 3 pre-filled KwikPens. Not all pack sizes may be marketed.

New -

https://www.medicines.org.uk/emc/product/15484/smpc

6.5 Nature and contents of container
Mounjaro 2.5 mg KwikPen solution for injection in pre‑filled pen
Each pre-filled KwikPen contains 10 mg of tirzepatide in 2.4 ml solution.
Pack sizes of 1 and 3 pre-filled KwikPens. Not all pack sizes may be marketed.

It could be also about maintaining safety. Of the license is based on correct dosing, they might have to show they are doing everything they can to remove risk.

And after 3 months of not ordering you’ll not be able to reorder a 15mg pen? Or are you going to order every 4 weeks and stock up?

If we got the pre-filled American style pens, do they allow for count clicks? I’ve not seen one but im
imagining them to be like an epi-pen so no priming involved. Not saying we are getting them just wondering.

It looks like it will be the same uk multidose kwikpen, but only filled with only the 2.4ml needed for 4 doses instead of 3ml.

not sure how the American ones work, probably lots of videos on YouTube will show you.

So no need or ability to prime the needle? Having had a few dodgy needles over my time I’d miss the ability to do that. But I can see they’ll want their money for as many pens a year as possible.

The instructions on the link still show priming. A two click prime is only 0.02ml which is probably negligible.

Definitely looks to be the case. Can’t say I’m surprised though as so many use that fifth dose, me included.

That's what I'm doing. Once I have enough stock to last me for about a year of maintenance after reaching my goal, I'll just stop.

Will have to wait and see. They would have to do a big manufacture change surely? To change the pen volume. It's not like they can just put a bit less into the existing pens is it? For one the final dose line would need to be moved right down to the bottom of the pen. We can't change it either way. I think I'm.done stressing over just getting any pen right now. It's becoming so stressful and if if this to just grab more money rather than remove all possibility of not using the pen exactly as intended it doesn't bode well.

They have a massive user bade now so can tighten the thumb screws.

Feels a bit like I'm trying score some crack right now just getting a pen tbh.

@NotPerfectlyAdverage I noticed this (picture) in the online user manual, not sure if new to the manual, I don’t recall seeing it before. It might be as simple as filling existing pens less which will be a fairly minor manufacturing setup change..

I'm still hoping this is just a tidy up of the legal paperwork as wording for UK has been different to others from what I've read. Seems unlikely, but not impossible, that EL would suddenly decide to go to the expense of redesigning the pens again now when they'd previously said this kwikpen was the one they wanted to introduce into the USA at some point 🤷‍♀️

(Happy to be corrected if I've got any facts muddled 😊).

They wouldn’t need to redesign the pen, just put less in and rewrite the guidance around how much to prime and how much is in it.

im assuming people would have noticed if their new pens had less in, so maybe coming soon?

I see this all over social media, I am not sure it’s true, we shall need to wait and see. I was intending staying on mj at 5mg, but I think I they do this I shall try wegovy, I think if it happened they would be moving to too much gouging.

It strikes me as though they don't actually need to put the amount of liquid in the pens that they currently do.

It either goes to waste for people who don't wish to do the golden dose.
Or people utilise it to get a fifth dose - but it's supposed to be a four dose pen
Or people do their own dosing anyway and ignore the four dose pen usage.

So if the pens are to work with four doses, plus some small priming, they don't need to fill with the same amount of liquid that they do so currently.

I'm actually surprised it's taken them this long to potentially decide to change it.

I do the golden dose myself.

I’ve just done my golden dose, there was 0.7ml left in my pen with priming, so they can definitely take some out. I’ll just do a smaller dose each week and still try and get five doses. I’m pretty much at maintenance so that’s fine for me.

Yes they do put too much liquid in the pens for ‘priming’
The pen will stop working after so many clicks so the excess medication is pretty pointless & a waste from Lilly’s point of view (but good for us!)

My guess is, if they’re planning to introduce the KwikPen to the US market, (probably their largest), they can’t afford for everyone to be taking a 5th dose so it’s worth them investing now to change. They were approved a change in ‘batch’ (no idea what that means) in June and the new SMPC was July, so that fits.

Quite possibly @GLP1Girl as it would be a big hit on their US sales.

The other one I was thinking about was the timing and perhaps there being 3ml of medication in the pen (even though only 2.4ml was accessible) that it might have to have been accounted for in the most favoured nation pricing calculations and if they left it in they might have had to make the UK pen prices even higher. Either way it lets me blame Trump again 🤣