Technical Information

This section is dedicated to technical information about Meridia. It details the class of drug that Meridia is, and details both how and why it works.

The active ingredient in Meridia is sibutramine. Sibutramine reduces appetite via its active primary and secondary metabolites which inhibit the uptake of serotonin, noradrenaline and dopamine. In clinical trials in humans, it has been shown that sibutramine has more effect on the uptake of seratonin and noradrenaline, with a very small effect on the uptake of dopamine.

In tests on animals using both rats that were lean and rats that were obese, sibutramine was seen to provoke reduced weight gain. It is believed that the drug sibutramine when taken orally leads to less food being eaten, as the effect of increased levels of brain serotonin enhances satisfaction with the food eaten. In human clinical trials, this effect was repeated. There is also some evidence to suggest that sibutramine makes the body produce more heat when at rest, which helps to reduce the effect of the metabolic slow down whilst losing weight.

Patients who experience weight loss when taking Meridia also benefit from changes in blood lipid levels and blood sugar levels, where patients have high cholesterol or type II diabetes.