In recent years, use of GLP-1 receptor agonist drugs like Ozempic have become an increasingly popular way to lose weight.
Although people can quickly lose huge amounts of weight while taking these drugs, there also appear to be less desirable, beauty-related side effects.
Many cosmetic dermatologists and plastic surgeons have highlighted how patients taking this medication may experience facial changes such as dry, dull or sagging skin, a gaunt or hollowed-out facial appearance, and other unwelcome alterations to their facial structure and facial balance.
Adipose-derived stem cells
Speaking at the global cosmetic dermatology and anti-ageing medical sector conference IMCAS earlier this year, in a discussion panel organised by Galderma, renowned facial plastic surgeon Dr Steven Dayan, M.D., FACS, noted that use of these drugs has triggered a new revolution in aesthetics.
“When my patients first get on these drugs, they aren’t worried about their skin. They say they just want to be thinner. But after a few months they start to notice the effects on the skin. It’s not initially, it’s over time,” he explained.
“I am seeing people who are taking these drugs and look a lot older than their age,” he said. “Biopsies of obese people show that their skin normal, but then after someone loses about 20% of their body fat, they start to lose collagen and elastin, their skin breaks down and they have a lot more wrinkles than what you would expect for someone of their age group.”
Dayan continued to say that this goes beyond simply losing the weight and instead is more likely related to how the use of this medication affects their adipose-derived stem cells – the “reservoir cells that prepare the skin to regenerate itself and look healthy.”
“These can get turned off by these drugs and we needed to find a way to turn them back on,” he shared.
Fat: “a huge regenerative organ”
Galderma’s Chief Scientific Officer and top plastic surgeon Professor Alan Widgerow highlighted the irony that many people have spent so many years trying to get rid of fat on our bodies and are now asking to replace it in certain areas.
“This revelation about fat being such a huge regenerative organ came to us a few years ago and the GLP-1 revolution started happening at the same time,” he revealed.
“We looked at the use of our Sculptra product (a biostimulator) and noticed that its effects were lasting longer and longer each time someone had the treatment. We realised it wasn’t just a collagen story and a bio-stimulatory story,” he continued.
Widgerow said that previously key signs of ageing were wrinkles and sagging skin, but these new medication-driven weight-loss patients were also experiencing volume loss “which is atrophy related to fat,” he explained. Therefore, the mystery of this new phenomenon led to breakthroughs for Galderma.
“There are conversations going on all the time between the fat and the dermis,” continued Widgerow.
“There is dynamic viscosity. This recuperation of the extracellular matrix; the thickening of the skin, is a huge conversation that goes on between fatty tissue and collagen and elastin within the dermis.”
“One particular area that no-one had focused on was that there is fat in that area too: dermal white adipose tissue,“ he continued. ”That fat is in the dermis, which is in the skin layer much higher than we thought before.”
So why hadn’t this been recognised before?
“Because those fat cells are preadipocytes (fat cell precursors) and they can look just like fibroblasts, but if you give them the right stimulants they can change,” Widgerow explained.
As a result, treating patients who have experienced the premature ageing affects of medication-driven weight loss has been a big focus for Galderma over the past year. To do so, it has been using a combination of its dermal fillers Restylane (either Lyft or Contour) and its biostimulator Sculptra.
This month (July 2025), Galderma said it has seen “positive final data from a phase IV first-of-its-kind trial.”
The research has shown that this combined regime has demonstrated skin quality improvements, with Restylane improving skin hydration and Sculptra improving skin radiance.
The company added that the new data from the study “reinforces that the treatment regimen can effectively improve facial aesthetic appearance with high patient satisfaction over nine months.”