ROCHESTER, N.Y. (WROC) – You may have heard about microdosing when people bring up drugs like psychedelics — but now there's a growing trend of people doing it with injectable weight loss drugs. Microdosing means taking less than the recommended or prescribed amount, and influencers on social media are promoting doing this with weight loss drugs, like Ozempic. "As a healthcare provider, I cannot endorse microdosing, because there is no evidence," said Dilendra Weerasinghe the Director of Bariatric Surgery at Rochester Regional Health. Weerasinghe says during the Covid pandemic, when there was a shortage of insulin and other medications used to treat diabetes, The American Diabetes Association said taking a smaller dose to prolong use was okay. "They have also mentioned that this practice is not endorsed by them any further," he added. Microdosing GLP-1s is not FDA approved. Weerasinghe says there are a few reasons people may be doing it. "Either because you have the ability to obtain the drug but the side effects are bad, so you want less of a dose. Or the cost of economics, because it's too expensive and you want it to stretch for a longer period of time, this is where, when you're faced with a situation like that, there are other and better options," he said. One option is bariatric surgery, where doctors work to divert nutrients in an accelerated way to the bottom part of the intestine. Weerasinghe said, "the beauty of bariatric surgery is that we don't play god, we just exploit the mechanisms which he has put in place." Like with most advice in the world of medicine, Weerasinghe says you should listen to your doctor. Though, he says, obesity is a disease that is difficult to cure and takes life changes to accomplish. ...read more read less