7 Surprising GLP-1 Benefits to Improve Metabolism

The GLP-1 benefits are many. GLP-1 agonists like Ozempic®, Monjouro®, Wegovy®, they all work to heal your metabolism and improve metabolic health. But a lot of people are getting these peptides wrong. They’re simplifying things and turning out a kindergarten version of GLP-1 benefits.

But I know you’re more intelligent than that. 

Which is why I want to give you the grown-up, 12th-grade version of how GLP-1 agonists work, and how they can really change your life when you use them properly. 

These are the types of GLP-1 benefits you probably haven’t heard of. And I’m willing to bet your doctor hasn’t heard about these benefits, either.

I am going to walk you through some biochemistry here, but I'll try to make it as user-friendly as possible. I know you need to hear this, because people are not understanding this peptide. They are vilifying it. They are misinterpreting studies or they're overblowing studies. I'm seeing so much clickbait, and I don’t want you to get discouraged or possibly reject a treatment that might be beneficial for you because of internet rumors.

So, let's get into the top seven GLP-1 benefits. The top ways that GLP-1 agonists improve your metabolic health that you don't know…and I am certain your doctor probably doesn't know, either.

If you want to learn more about GLP-1 agonists, be sure to grab my FREE 4-part course, Ozempic Uncovered. This is the unbiased, research-backed resource about GLP-1 agonists you’ve been looking for. 

In this article you’ll learn:

• More about GLP-1 agonists and how they work
• How to make the most of treatment with GLP-1s (it’s more than just the medication!)
• Where insulin resistance really starts

Listen to my podcast about this subject HERE

7 Surprising GLP-1 Benefits to Improve Metabolism

Every time I turn on the news and I see somebody talking about GLP -1s, every time I open YouTube and someone says, “I'm going to tell you how GLP -1s work,” they miss the mark. They parrot the the same stuff over and over, without getting into the real benefits of these drugs. 

So, let’s dig into the GLP-1 benefits. 

GLP-1 Benefit #1: GLP1s Promote Insulin Secretion Appropriately 

This is the part everyone misses. GLP-1 agonists don’t just crank out insulin. 

Let’s think about it for a moment. If insulin resistance is the issue, we don't need more insulin. That's not how GLP-1s work. Instead, they support insulin secretion appropriately — when needed. 

GLP-1s help the insulin response become a much more healthy pulsing than what was happening in the body before.

GLP1 Benefit #2: Help Control Appetite

Dose GLP-1 agonists too high, and you're going to get into appetite suppression, but dose appropriately, and you're going to get appetite control.

This allows people to have more control over the vices in their life — one of them being food.

But there are many other GLP-1 benefits, too. Including appetite suppression, appetite control, and a decrease in food intake. and this has everybody arguing, even some of the smartest doctors on the internet saying, well, this proves that it's just the calories in and calories out model. That's how you lose weight.

No — 1980 called, they want their busted weight loss theories back. That's not it. Delayed gastric emptying so people feel fuller longer and this all ultimately leads to fat reduction. This is how it's being shared but this is the kindergarten version.

Let’s keep digging deeper.

GLP1 Benefit #3: They Decrease Glucagon Concentrations In The Body

Glucagon works sort of opposite insulin and our bodies sequester glucose into our muscles and into our liver to be used as fuel later when we need it, like when a tiger's chasing us and we need to run away or after we've slept for eight hours and we wake up and we need fuel, our cells need fuel — and this is where glucagon comes in. 

So glucagon is a glucoregulatory peptide hormone that is also secreted by the pancreas, by the way, little neighboring cells to the ones that secrete insulin. And ultimately, it stimulates hepatic glucose production and thus increases blood glucose levels when needed. GLP-1s lower glucagon secretion and therefore lower glucose concentrations in the blood. So we get a healthier insulin pulse and we get some glucagon suppression. This is actually a really important concept that most people miss.

GLP1 Benefit #4: Increase Insulin Sensitivity

The underlying issue with metabolic dysfunction is basically four major things. Number one, insulin resistance. Number two, lack of muscle. Number three, lack of exercise. And number four, which is the overarching theme — lack of glucose sinks. 

Lack of Glut4 transporters on the cellular membrane of our bodies to let glucose in the cell to be used as fuel. 

GLP-1s can help induce certain pathways like AMPK, CERT -1, which ultimately leads to PGC -1 alpha stimulation, which ultimately leads to optimized mitochondrial function, which ultimately leads to better glucose disposal. 

So we are supercharging the mitochondria through activation of these pathways that we can also activate through exercise and through caloric restriction. So if we can get some appetite control, and we can suppress appetite a bit (or just at least get it to a place where they're able to go from 7 pm until 7 am without eating, that's a nice intermittent fast window), then we're going to be activating these pathways twofold, right? We're going to double up, we're going to stack. 

In other words, we’re going to get better results. 

The most awesome way to activate these pathways is through exercise. The actual act of muscle contractions also helps get that Glut4 receptor translocated to the cellular membrane to open up and let the glucose in to be used as fuel. 

Sure, a low-carb diet can help you become more insulin-sensitive. But instead of having diet be your whole strategy, you have other tools at your disposal like exercise, like building muscle, like caloric restriction and intermittent fasting, like muscle contractions, we have those and we stack them and also GLP -1 agonists activate these pathways. 

This is why I say the lifestyle modifications are non-negotiable. The strength training is non-negotiable. Start with the strength training, actually. 

But we can utilize GLP-1s and very likely in much lower doses, this is where my microdosing Ozempic strategy comes into play because we're doing all the other things and we're stacking these therapeutics so that we can get optimal AMPK CERT1 pathway activation. It's such an awesome peptide that way, and it helps potentiate the other efforts we're putting forth and gets them to work better. 

GLP1 Benefit #5: They Protect Muscle

And I've talked about this at length, I have a whole podcast episode here that’s all about how GLP-1 protects muscle and how it may actually be somewhat anabolic. These peptides help heal and regenerate pathologic tissue really when you think of it. 

And the way that I look at regeneration is not necessarily, if you put some muscle cells in a P2 dish and you drip GLP1 on it it'll make more muscle cells. That's not what I'm talking about. 

I'm talking about the pathological pathways that start to take hold in the insulin-resistant and metabolically compromised muscle. That muscle becomes pathologic. Dr. Gabrielle Lyon does a beautiful job of breaking this down and saying, you know, not all muscle is alike. The muscle of a type 2 diabetic is a very different type of tissue than the muscle of somebody who is insulin sensitive, metabolically sound, having good training, regularly training their skeletal muscle. That's a very different muscle. It behaves very differently in the body. And it does very different things with our signaling peptide hormones, with our hormones in general, with inflammatory markers, et cetera, anti-inflammatory markers. 

So GLP-1s start to help transform that muscle back into a healthier state. And it does so through, to some degree, like reperfusion of microvasculature into the muscle, which allows essential amino acids to get in there, which allows for improved muscle protein synthesis. 

This is almost an anabolic impact on the muscle and we have studies in humans and aging humans showing this. It's protective. It's healing to the muscle. And so when I say regenerative what I mean is we are abating that pathological process. 

So yes, GLP1s are awesome for muscle, bones, joints, cartilage —  you name it. They are doing really incredible things.

Microdosing Ozempic

Now, I think here the dose makes the poison. If we overdose somebody they're gonna go into a catabolic state and they're going to waste away and we're gonna lose muscle tissue and we're probably going to lose bone and hair and teeth too. So the dose makes the poison and this is where my microdosing strategy comes in. 

I go deep inside my program, Ozempic Done Right University, on my clinical rationale for microdosing.

What you're hearing out there when the term is getting around, I'm hearing from doctors and pharmacists, the term is really getting around out there. And there are folks saying, “I've been microdosing my patients for years.” And when I inquire as to what their dosing strategy is, they're actually just starting folks at the standard starting dose, which I think is way too high for most people, especially those of us who are already doing all the things and are 99% metabolically sound. The standard starting dose is way too high. 

I'm utilizing a fraction of that, but that fraction only works when you're doing all the other things and you come to the peptide already in pretty good shape and pretty good health. Microdosing is reserved for those who are metabolically optimized already. We just need a little bit of tinkering. It's not that successful in those who are really metabolically compromised. Those folks are going to need a more standard dose, but low-dosing GLP-1 agonists is not microdosing. 

So starting somebody at the standard starting dose, and then these docs are even just going to the next tier, which is a doubling of the dose within four weeks. I think that's bonkers and not even necessary in those who are metabolically compromised. I think those folks need to go much slower and lower, but I'm going to leave it up to you and your doctor. 

Just know I'm getting messages from people almost daily, from either colleagues or my followers saying, “I'm microdosing GLP-1s either in my patients or I'm microdosing it on myself and I feel awful. What am I doing wrong? I feel awful.”

And the problem is, they’re not microdosing, they're overdosing. When I talk about microdosing Ozempic, I'm talking about utilizing a fraction of the starting dose. 

And then I'm getting messages from people almost every day too claiming they tried my microdosing strategy and it didn’t work…although they have no idea what my microdosing strategy is — because they didn't take my course and they don't know me and they are just guesstimating based on the information I've shared in different podcasts.

And wonder, well, it didn't work for what? Because there's no way a microdose is gonna work for weight loss in an obese, metabolically compromised person. I never said that, I've been very clear from day one that this strategy is reserved for those of us who are metabolically optimized already.

If you're not metabolically optimized and you want to utilize GLP-1s, then a very slow and low strategy is what you're going to want to do so you don't get side effects. But that said, there is a whole comprehensive toolkit that I'm using over here that I go deep into inside my program that you're going to want to join and learn about if you're a practitioner (or if you're the general public). For a limited time, I'm still letting the general public in, but we're shutting that down pretty soon. So get in there. It's a beefy course, and the only way out is through.

Learn more about Ozempic Done Right University HERE.

Doctors Don’t Understand How To Microdose Ozempic

The only way through is to be educated and empower yourself. And I'm telling you, most doctors have no clue how to do this appropriately. They're just simply starting patients on a standard starting dose and ramping them up very quickly, which is a disaster waiting to happen. But they also don't know how to deal with maintenance. They don't know how to cycle. They don't know how to rotate. They have no clue what that even means.

They have no idea how to titrate you down if you want to get off of it. They just shut you off. It's a mess. So that's an even longer conversation.

Trust me, get the course while it's the price point it is, while it's available to the public so that you can educate yourself and you can go in and have an educated conversation with your practitioner. 

Because people from all over the world are messaging me asking if I can refer them to somebody in their area who practices as I do. 

And the honest truth is, I don’t know enough people who are doing this correctly. 

Inside my program, we have probably 50% practitioners or just over at this point and we do have a spreadsheet of all of those people who have at least enrolled in the course. I have no idea what their skill set is. I have no idea if they've even completed the module, so I'm not recommending them. But they are enrolled in the course, so they at least have access to what the big comprehensive picture looks like — because there's a lot more to this than just microdosing or macrodosing GLP-1 agonists. 

Think of it like a symphony. We need all the instruments, and we need the conductor to make the symphony sound cohesive and work well, right? Otherwise, we're cranking monotherapy on one thing or another. We're either cranking up hormones or we're cranking up peptides and that is not the elegant way to do things and that certainly isn't conducive to longevity. 

GLP1 Benefit #6: Improves Insulin Sensitivity In The Fat Tissue 

When adipose tissue becomes insulin resistant and it becomes metabolically compromised itself, all hell breaks loose in the body.

The cells get infiltrated by immune cells. Those immune cells shift into a form that's very pro-inflammatory. You get a compromised immune system. You get compromised metabolic health. It feeds forward and potentiates itself. It's like a chicken and egg at that point. It gets very, very messy. This is, in my opinion, the driving factor behind the poor outcomes of the past four-plus years that we've been seeing with a certain virus going around. This is what I've been trying to explain to people is that when your fat cells go rogue, as I call it, all hell breaks loose in the body and it becomes a very vicious cycle that's challenging to get out of. 

There is a way to abate this, but it gets harder and harder and harder the older you are or the more metabolically compromised or the more inflamed you are. 

And the more rogue their adipose fat cells have gone, the more challenging it is to not only pull them back, but keep them there. This is the point that so few people understand about weight loss. Again, 1980 called, they want their busted, eat less and move more strategy back, because it ain't working. 

This is because I believe at the core of this is when the fat cells go rogue. What happens when you're young is you add more fat cells. This is why it is so important to get children the interventions they need, whatever that may be. Obviously, lifestyle is at the core platform of all the things I recommend, but if they do need some interventions, this is important because they're adding fat cells to their body. 

But as we age, we just fill up our fat cells and it's the ultra full fat cell that goes, it's like a gremlin when you feed them after midnight, right? Remember that in the movie Gremlins? You feed them after midnight or you get them wet or whatever and they just, they turn into gremlins. That's what happens to fat cells when they get super full. They get inflamed, they get pissed off and the feed-forward cycle of that is very challenging for individuals to get out of. When it gets really severe, these are the folks that I think do need the higher doses of the GLP-1s and they're probably gonna be on them for life because there's a shift that has occurred and sometimes we can't pull people back over the other side of it. That shift is always going to want to go in that direction. 

Chronic inflammation in the adipose tissue is a major cause of insulin resistance type 2 diabetes and further obesity. 

GLP1 Benefit #7: Reduces Endoplasmic Reticulum Stress

GLP-1 reduces endoplasmic reticulum (ER) stress. These are these little organelles inside your cells and they actually are responsible for building and folding proteins appropriately in the body. Misfolded proteins cause chaos. We don't want them. 

So GLP-1 reduces ER stress, which is a key factor in the development of metabolic syndrome. Unresolved ER stress has been implicated in a variety of metabolic disorders, including type 2 diabetes and obesity. GLP -1 regulates key genetic pathways that have to do with protein folding in the fat cells themselves that when dysregulated, lead to fat gain.

Perturbations in ER homeostasis create this condition of ER stress that leads to the activation of this complex signaling cascade called the unfolded protein response. Intervening on ER stress is critical when we want to modulate the signaling components of this UPR, which GLP1s do. So they're acting at an organelle level inside the cell to help improve how that cell behaves and how it plays out in a way that helps mitigate further potentiation of insulin resistance and obesity gain. 

It's acting on specific pathways that help improve mitochondrial function. So ER dysfunction and mitochondrial dysfunction are at the root core of this adipocyte/fat cell gone rogue problem. 

GLP-1 is acting directly there to help regulate these pathways. I think it's incredible. Just an incredible peptide.

And this is where the people screaming that this drug should be recalled. I'm embarrassed for those people. There are people right now who've got big platforms, big stages, and have just been on big television shows screaming that this drug should be recalled. 

My response? 

First, it's not a drug. Second of all, you're not a practitioner of any sort, so you have no idea. Number three, it's a peptide which is regenerative. It's not a drug. Number four, they don't understand what I'm telling you, what I'm sharing here. 

And this is important even for those who have just put on 15, or 20 pounds. If you're in middle age and your hormones are dropping, man or woman, and you suddenly get a middle, you know, the middle age middle starts creeping up, that's these problems I've just described happening in real-time. 

It's unethical to not understand how something works and withhold it from a patient if you're a practitioner. Just because the dosing strategy around it in the allopathic community at large, I believe is too high, too fast, too much — it's not the peptide's fault. That's a dosing and management issue. We just need to treat it better. We don't overdose people on insulin and then blame the insulin, right? We blame the doctor for overdosing or we blame patient compliance.

We don't blame the peptide when the patient doesn't do anything and doesn't exercise and doesn't eat well, right? So there are a lot of factors here to be considered before we start recalling peptides that are virtually life-saving. I've never seen anything quite as powerful and versatile as GLP1s.

How To Get Microdoses of GLP1

My signature microdosing strategy involves using fractions of the starting dose, which means we need it compounded. This isn't available through big pharma.

You can't get fractions of the starting dose from the pens that are pre-filled. This is a compounded thing. I'm talking about utilizing compounded medications in a safe and effective way, elegantly as part of a comprehensive treatment program. Again, I go into this very deep inside my paid program so that if you're a practitioner, you can understand how to treat your patients better. And if you are the general public, you will educate and inform yourself and walk into your doctor with all the knowledge and tools you need to get them to understand this strategy.

This is how we work with our doctors like a teammate. They're not gods and you're not helpless. It's a team effort.

I also have a 30-plus page document that's growing with all the studies that I find that I'm dumping into this document. So you can go in armed and say, hey, I wanna have a conversation. This is the data I found. I think this peptide could be helpful for me. There's also a list of compounding pharmacies available inside the course. 

To be fair, you have to be compliant, you have to do all the things, you have to do all the lifestyle pieces if you want this to work — even if you high dose it. Bottom line, you have to do all the lifestyle pieces. 

But that said, your doctor needs to be a team player too. And if he or she isn't, you need to find a new one. There's actually a whole module on how to find a good doctor in there too. 

Learn more about Ozempic Done Right University HERE. 

GLP1 Benefits: Recap

So back to the fat cells, gone rogue.

GLP -1 can also improve insulin signaling by decreasing the expression of certain genes in the stressed ER adipocytes that are responsible for further fat gain and exacerbation of obesity, further amplifying the ER stress. So it breaks the cycle, which I think is just phenomenal.

Many studies have suggested that the effect of GLP -1 on insulin sensitivity is attributable to the suppression of weight gain. However, a 2016 study and others have shown this was done with exenatide, which is like the OG original GLP-1 agonist, improves both hepatic and adipose tissue insulin resistance. (1) 

So we get insulin resistance in our fat, we get insulin resistance in our liver. And when that happens, it's a whole downstream. We're talking hormones get involved like estrogen, testosterone, inflammatory markers are getting on board and we can improve that whole breakdown of metabolic dysfunction by affecting the liver and the adipose tissue and the insulin resistance in those organs. 

So this is huge. Immune cells, we have GLP -1 receptors on our immune cells, on our macrophages in particular, which is a big deal. You've heard probably about histamine intolerance and mast cell activation syndrome. Well, this is something to be considered and GLP1s can improve insulin resistance in the macrophages. So we get insulin resistance in our immune cells by inhibiting the NF-kappa B pathway. It also has an impact on TNF alpha. So these are cytokine pathways. And when our immune cells have gone rogue, we now become a little inflammatory factory. And it's being driven by the inflammatory fat, which is being driven by the inflamed liver and the fatty infiltrate in the muscle and in the liver and in the pancreas that's also inflamed. It's a vicious cycle and GLP1s help cut this at virtually every step of the way and get it back under control. 

So when we can slow the secretion of inflammatory cytokines we’re winning. Inflammation, GLP-1 has anti-inflammatory properties. We've seen this in multiple studies that could help inhibit insulin resistance. So this kind of pulls together everything I've just said. When that inflammation starts brewing in the body, all of these other things go with it concomitantly and that's the vicious cycle that's very difficult to break. I'm telling you, eat less and move more is not always going to cut it. Even for people like myself who are very lean, low body fat percentages. Eat less and move more isn't always it. I have a funny immune system. It likes to go rogue on me. It likes to be inflamed. And it takes a lot to keep that dampened down.

Even eating like a saint to the point where I'm eating such a restrictive diet, I can't function in the world. Still, my body wants to go to a more inflammatory state. These are the people that can benefit from GLP1s.

The Life Changing Magic Of GLP1 Agonists

Bottom line, these GLP1s are life-saving and they're life-changing, but they need to be done differently. The way that they're being done, I think is very problematic. I go into this in my four-part FREE video training series > Grab it HERE. 

I think on part four video, you'll get offered my course, Ozempic Done Right University, and you'll get a nice discount there. So that's the best way to go into it and to get the discount and to learn the most, because I take you on an educational journey that whether you love them or hate them, this will change your perspective, because people need to know what's going on here, and we're not being told the whole truth. 

And in fact, we're being spun a lot of clickbaity, propagandized titles. I just saw one come across, a news publication I really respect, and it was just ridiculous. It's ridiculous. It's about the World Health Organization's latest publication in JAMA about how GLP-1's cause suicidal ideation. It's not true. They don't cause anything. It's correlative. The authors of the study actually gave a big old paragraph of all the limitations and said we should take this with a grain of salt essentially. And also the people who did have suicidal ideation. If my numbers are right, I'm reading it right off the study, it was 107 people out of 36 million, and of them, several were on antidepressants and benzodiazepines. So they probably went into this having some suicidal ideation. (2)

GLP1s And The Brain

Chronic inflammation in adipose tissue or fat cells is the cause of insulin resistance in type 2 diabetes. Chronic inflammation in the muscles is what starts and potentiates insulin resistance and diabetes. 

This is fundamental to understand — and GLP-1s break that vicious cycle. And then the last way is that GLP-1s may alleviate insulin resistance in the brain. They're anti-inflammatory in the brain. They're neuro-regenerative. We have studies on mice and rats showing remyelination of the demyelinated nervous tissue up there. (3)

It's amazing what these peptides can do. If we can get the insulin resistance centrally to chill out, everything starts centrally and everything moves peripherally. 

This is where my research with GLP -1 started. I am fascinated by how they work in the brain, and that's where I started with this whole journey that's led me here. And when I saw how they impacted the brain, I immediately knew because I am also a chiropractor and we are very good at neurophysiology. I know people think that chiropractors just rack and crack, but we actually have an incredible neuroanatomy and neurophysiology education, at least at the school I went to.

Everything starts in the brain and everything that's control central. So if we want to impact organ systems downstream and tissues downstream peripherally, we have to figure out how to treat and impact centrally. And this is where GLP-1s really shine.

GLP-1 Benefits: Final Thoughts

All right, so that is it. Those are the seven ways that you probably didn't know and I don't think your doctor did either on how GLP-1s improve and help heal your metabolic health. 

And it has a lot more to do with all these nuanced biochemical pathways and genetic pathways than it does with eating less, appetite suppression, keeping your stomach from emptying, and so you feel fuller longer. That is like the kindergarten version. I just gave you the college version. 

For more content like this, be sure to rate, review, and subscribe to the Dr. Tyna Show, (rated top 5 alternative health on Apple podcasts) on your favorite podcast player. 

I think the medical system at large is really busted, and it’s up to you to learn how to take care of yourself and empower yourself and educate yourself about what you're putting in your body and really understand the mechanism of action as best you can with any prescriptions you take. I want to make sure you have full informed consent when it comes to GLP1s.

For even more information, be sure to grab my FREE 4-part video series, Ozempic Uncovered here.

References

1. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27639082/
2. https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle/2822453#zoi240740t1

      3. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9298969/