You're asking about two different investigational drugs:
cagrilintide and
retatrutide.
It's important to understand that:
- Neither cagrilintide nor retatrutide are currently approved for general clinical use. They are still in clinical trials. This means there isn't a "standard" starting dose established for prescription in a typical doctor's office.
- You would not typically start cagrilintide when starting with retatrutide, as they are separate medications, though both are being investigated for weight management. Clinical trials would test them individually or in specific combinations.
Let's break down what's known about their starting doses in clinical trials:
Cagrilintide:
- Cagrilintide is often being studied in combination with semaglutide as CagriSema.1
- In clinical trials for CagriSema, a gradual dose-escalation approach is used.2 Participants often start with a low dose, such as 0.25 mg per week for both cagrilintide and semaglutide, and then the doses are co-escalated over several weeks (e.g., to 0.5 mg, 1.0 mg, 1.7 mg, and finally to a maintenance dose of 2.4 mg per week for each medication over 16 weeks).
- In studies of cagrilintide alone, doses have ranged from 0.3 mg to 4.5 mg per week. Some studies have started participants at 0.6 mg per week, doubling the dose every two weeks to reach 2.4 mg per week by the fourth week.3
Retatrutide:
- Retatrutide is a triple-agonist, acting on GLP-1, GIP, and glucagon receptors.4
- Similar to other injectable weight loss medications in development, retatrutide trials also use a dose titration approach.
- A typical starting dose in clinical trials for retatrutide has been around 0.5 mg to 1 mg per week.
- The dose is then gradually increased over several weeks (e.g., to 2 mg, 4 mg, 8 mg, and eventually to a highest studied dose of 12 mg per week, or even 20 mg in some earlier studies).
Key Takeaway:
Since both cagrilintide and retatrutide are investigational, their dosing protocols are part of ongoing research. Any use of these medications would be within the context of a clinical trial, where specific protocols for starting and escalating doses would be followed under strict medical supervision. They are not available for prescription outside of these research settings.
