DEAR DR. GOTT: I have been reading about a diet using hCG drops on Facebook. Apparently, three drops under the tongue three times a day rids you of hunger pain, and then you only eat 500 calories a day for a month with a loss of 30 pounds a month. What do you know about this drug?
DEAR READER: This diet fad frightens me.
First, hCG (human chorionic gonadotropin) is an FDA-approved prescription-only drug for fertility. HCG is a hormone present in pregnant women’s urine and was first discovered in 1927. To this day, physicians look for this hormone to determine pregnancy. Levels peak at around 14 weeks’ gestation and then drop off for the remainder of the pregnancy.
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