Monitoring Report: GLP-1 RA Prescribing Trends – March 2025 Data

Background

Limited recent data exist on prescribing patterns and patient characteristics for glucagon-like peptide 1 receptor agonists (GLP-1 RAs), an important drug class used as anti-diabetic medication (ADM) for patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2D) and/or anti-obesity medication (AOM) in patients with overweight or obesity.

For brevity, we use the term GLP-1 RA to refer to both GLP-1 RA and dual GLP-1 RA/GIP medications.

Objective

To describe recent trends in prescribing and dispensing of GLP-1-based medications in the US.

Methods

Using a subset of real-world electronic health record (EHR) data from Truveta, a growing collective of health systems that provide more than 18% of all daily clinical care in the US, we identified people who were prescribed a GLP-1-based medication between January 01, 2018 and March 31, 2025. We describe prescribing volumes and patient characteristics over time, by medication, and by FDA-labeled use. Among the subset of patients for whom post-prescription dispensing data is available, we describe the proportion and characteristics of patients who were and were not dispensed a GLP-1 RA following their prescription.

Results

1,970,374 patients were prescribed a GLP-1 RA between January 2018 and March 2025, with 9,376,686 total prescriptions during this period. Among first-time prescriptions for which use could be established, ADMs accounted for 75.8% and AOMs accounted for 24.2%. The most common first-time medication was semaglutide (n = 1,066,552). Among those with available data, 69.1% of first-time ADM prescriptions overall and 71.0% in December 2024 had a fill within 60 days. By comparison, 46.4% of first-time AOM prescriptions overall and 50.5% in December 2024 had a fill within 60 days.