More Advice Please

[Miababe]

I asked the ladies on here whether in their experience I should go down the band, sleeve, or weight loss injections with a BMI of 31 and hypertension, severe apnoea and OA of hips and hands. You all gave me some really good advice, thank you.
I have decided to give Mounjaro a try as it is the preferred med for severe apnoea and OA in the USA. But I still have some questions please:

I will go the local pharmacy as they have a weight loss clinic initially, but what happens if you shop around for lower prices as time goes on and you are under the 30 BMI or 27 BMI weight by then? Do you have to stay with your original provider who know you history?

If you lose weight on Mounjaro and want to maintain but do not see yourself paying even the lowest injection price would you move over to the upcoming Wegovy tablets or alternatives coming out for Mounjaro?

I watched an interesting Oprah Winfrey show on U tube about WLI. The medical expert said that obesity was a disease and that our bodies set a weight and even if we lose weight our bodies will encourage us to go back to that set weight and it might be an unhealthy weight.

The tennis champion Serena Williams was a guest and is a huge advocate for WLI using them herself. She said even when she was training for hours a day and eating lean and healthy she couldn't shift the weight. How can that be I thought exercise burnt the fuel of food. She also said she would go back to this unhealthy weight whatever she did.

If you lose the weight you hope to back to a healthy weight and in the process lose your co-morbidities like mine ie high BP, OA or sleep apnoea will you maintain on the medication long term or try and keep it down yourself with learnt lifestyle changes?

Just wanted to add - I sent a message to my GP asking if she thought I was a good candidate for WLI and for her to note my weight and the date of me starting. I did this just in case they lower the BMI or criteria for weight loss medication in the future and I want to maintain with medication from the NHS as it might be hard to prove I had a BMI of 31 and used the meds if I am standing there at a healthy weight. Mind you apparently some med providers do inform the GP practice you belong to - just a thought.

Ok so to try and answer your queries...
Once you have a box from your first order, clearly stating your name date and prescription, you can use a photo of that as evidence for a new provider. I shopped around often to get the best new customer discounts.

I am now maintaining on a lower dose of mounjaro and wouldnt consider wegovy at the moment in case it didnt work for me or gave me side effects. I assume pill versions are stronger to get past the stomach acid so i prefer an injection personally. The price doesnt seem to be very different either. But, some people hate needles so tablets may work best for them. If there was a mounjaro pill developed i may reconsider.

There are people who stop the medication and dont regain weight but most will need to stay on it. As with all meds, if you dont take them they wont work.

I gained weight recently and my immediate thought was to up my dosage when actually i just needed to go back to basics with tracking food, water intake and trying to get more sleep.

I dont pay too much attention to serena williams, her husband is an investor in a company that provide the glp1 meds so its not exactly unbiased.

I wouldnt hold out hope for the NHS, the criteria is high now and i imagine always will be, due to cost.

Are you in the US or the UK? It's not clear from your post.

Anyway, if you are in the UK, it doesn't matter if your BMI drops below 30 or 27 if you change pharmacies, those are the starting criteria not the continuing criteria. You just would show evidence of your previous prescription, the easiest way to do that is a photo of the prescription label on the medication box. That shows your name, the date, the medication name and the dose level.

I would not expect at all for the NHS to pick up your prescription in future tbh.

Set point theory is a theory, not fact. Obesity does change your fat cells so if you lose weight then body tends towards regain and your appetite will increase to match the calorie intake that your hormones are prompting you to eat.
However if you maintain weight loss for a significant period of time there is a theory that set point can change. That's why it's important to stay on the medication for a period after you reach goal weight. This also helps support habit change through neural plasticity.