What is Contrave?
Contrave is a weight loss tablet that works in the brain to alter feelings of hunger and how your body spends energy. You’ll start off on a low dose of one tablet per day, and gradually increase this to two tablets twice a day over the first four weeks.
When it’s used alongside a calorie controlled diet and regular exercise, it can be very effective at helping people lose weight. In clinical trials, people taking naltrexone and bupropion had a ‘mean’ (average) weight loss of 5.4% when taking it over 54 weeks, and a mean weight loss of 8.1% when it was combined with behavioral counseling.
Contrave is a medicine that’s only available by prescription, so you’ll need to have a consultation with us about it before you use it.
How does Contrave work?
Contrave weight loss tablets contain naltrexone and bupropion, and these work on the specific area of the brain that controls how much food you eat and how energy is spent. By affecting cravings for food, it makes it less likely you’ll overeat, which can lead to significant weight loss if you make adjustments to your lifestyle too.
The ingredient bupropion is also used in some antidepressant medications, as well as a popular stop smoking treatment called Zyban. So Contrave is quite different to the weight loss tablet Orlistat, which affects how much fat you take up from food.
Is Contrave effective?
Contrave has been shown to work well in clinical trials, and be even more effective when used alongside weight loss management counseling. In a study of people taking it over 56 weeks, there was an average weight loss of 5.4%, and an average weight loss of 8.1% in people who also had behavioral support.
In a combined analysis of studies, up to 42% of people taking Contrave over 56 weeks lost at least 5% of their body weight, and up to 22% lost 10% of their body weight. So it has proven to be effective for a sizable portion of people that take it.