The Influence of Liraglutide on the Reward Properties of Food: an fMRI Study on Healthy Volunteers

What this study is testing ClinicalTrials.gov NCT01695109 ↗

Description as written by the study sponsor.

Clinical experience has confirmed the anorexic effect of Glucagon-like-peptide 1 (GLP-1) mimetics in comparison to DPP-4 inhibitors. A possible mechanism of this effect might be associated with changes in food choices, as suggested by animal studies. It has been shown that functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) of the brain is a valuable tool in obesity research and can be used to study the response of several brain regions to the visual presentation of preferred in comparison to non preferred food items and to non food items The aim of this study is to search for possible effects of liraglutide in comparison to placebo on 1. food choices and 2. changes in brain function as evidenced by fMRI in healthy volunteers. Findings of this study will help not only to get deeper insight into the mechanism of the anorexic effect of GLP-1 mimetics, but also into the regulation of food choices per se. In the future, it is planned to extend the results of this study in normal weight volunteers to obese diabetic subjects.

Treatments tested

• Liraglutide also known as Victoza Drug

  sc injections of 0.6 mg Liraglutide daily for three continuous days.

• Placebo also known as Isotonic saline Drug

  0.9% NaCl, 0.2 ml