I was diagnosed with PCOS when I was 25 years old. After having all of the symptoms since I was in high school, it wasn’t until 10 years later that PCOS was a *thing.* One of the more irritating symptoms of PCOS is inexplicable weight gain, and then that weight gain causes infertility—your hormones are messed up from being “overweight” and then you don’t ovulate at all or you ovulate totally randomly—to put it simply. Plus the extra heavy periods and cramps don’t help either.
My doctor put me on Ozempic to help with weight loss and to control my PCOS. While I am not in the market to get pregnant again, Redditors are claiming that Ozempic helped them get pregnant. Dr. Iman Saleh, an obstetrician and gynecologist, and director of obesity medicine at the bariatrics department at Northwell, spoke with PEOPLE and explained why this may be the case.
“I’ve actually seen a few patients of mine that have come in after a couple of months of usage of the medication for weight loss and have these surprise babies or surprise pregnancies,” Dr. Saleh said in an interview. She added that in a roundabout way, Semaglutide—the active ingredient in Ozempic and other weight-loss drugs that not only help PCOS but treats Type 2 Diabetes—is increasing fertility in patients.
“I’ve struggled with infertility issues because of PCOS/insulin resistance/obesity and while I’m still overweight, I finally got a positive test!” one redditor shared.
Dr. Saleh explained, “Even if it’s a 5-to-10 pound weight loss, this can actually have patients resume ovulation and be able to get pregnant.”
“Our fat cells produce estrogen and estrogen can have a negative effect on our ovaries in terms of decreased or dysfunction of ovulation. It can also have negative effects on our endometrial lining,” Dr. Saleh added. “Once you lose that weight, even if it’s very slight, they become more fertile and get pregnant.”
Has anyone ever gotten pregnant while on O?
byu/BreadfruitSecret4289 inOzempic
Another redditor shared, “I have fertility issues and I started taking it in February. I got pregnant while on Ozempic in April.” She said she had lost 20 pounds and she stopped taking Ozempic when she found out she was pregnant.
At the time when she posted her news to Reddit, she said, “I’m 8 weeks now and everything is fine. From what I’ve read, it’s common if you aren’t using protection (which we don’t because the chances of me getting pregnant are low). I have PCOS. Insulin and glucose levels affect my hormones in huge ways.”
She said making her insulin and glucose levels normal helped with her fertility.
“Either way, it’s possible,” she said. “I’ve been off for about 3-to-4 weeks now and I haven’t gained any weight back, but I am also in the throes of morning sickness.”
But what about women who are on birth control, like this redditor explained in the thread. “I was on birth control and this pregnancy was very much unplanned. I have a long history of miscarriages and stillbirth and had decided to stop trying to conceive two years ago, and during that time I started Ozempic and lost 70 pounds.”
Saleh says getting pregnant while on birth control can occur because Semaglutide alters how birth control is absorbed in the body.
“There is a component with the decreased gastric emptying or the slowing of the gut,” she explained to PEOPLE. “As we use these medications to make people feel fuller, the absorption changes in our body. And therefore the absorption of patients on birth control can affect the efficacy of the birth control.”
So if you’re on Semaglutide and birth control and don’t want to become pregnant, use protection.
Whether you’re using Semaglutide to help form healthy habits and lifestyle changes to lose weight, or if you’re trying to get pregnant, I feel like Ozempic and other drugs like it are going to be yet another tool to add to our toolbox for managing PCOS and all the negatives that come along with it.