Dulaglutide: uses, dosing, side effects & brands
Dulaglutide is a medicine sold in the U.S. under one brand, for type 2 diabetes mellitus. Below: what the FDA label says, every product that contains it, what the pills look like, and its recall record.
Key facts
- Treats
- Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus
- Available as
- Injectable
- Sold as
- Trulicity
- Prescription?
- Prescription only
- Generic available?
- Not in our catalog
- Boxed warning
- Boxed warning
How dulaglutide is dosed
From the FDA label for Trulicity. Other dulaglutide products — different forms, different strengths — are dosed differently. Follow the label for the one you were prescribed.
Adult Dosage ( 2.1 ) Recommended starting dosage is 0.75 mg injected subcutaneously once weekly. Increase dosage to 1.5 mg once weekly for additional glycemic control. If additional glycemic control is needed, increase dosage in 1.5 mg increments after at least 4 weeks on the current dosage. Maximum recommended dosage is 4.5 mg injected subcutaneously once weekly. Pediatric Dosage ( 2.2 ) Recommended starting dosage is 0.75 mg injected subcutaneously once weekly. If additional glycemic control is needed, increase dosage to the maximum recommended dosage of 1.5 mg once weekly after at least 4 weeks on the 0.75 mg dosage. Recommendations Regarding Missed Dose ( 2.3 ) If a dose is missed, administer the missed dose as soon as possible if there are at least 3 days (72 hours) until the next scheduled dose. Important Administration Instructions ( 2.4 ) Administer once weekly at any time of day with or without food. Inject subcutaneously in the abdomen, thigh, or upper arm. 2.1 Adult Dosage The recommended starting dosage of TRULICITY is 0.75 mg injected subcutaneously once weekly. Increase the dosage to 1.5 mg once weekly for additional glycemic control. If additional glycemic control is needed, increase the dosage in 1.5 mg increments after at least 4 weeks on the current dosage. The maximum recommended dosage is 4.5 mg injected subcutaneously once weekly. 2.2 Pediatric Dosage The…
Dulaglutide side effects
The following serious reactions are described below or elsewhere in the prescribing information: Risk of Thyroid C-cell Tumors [see Warnings and Precautions ( 5.1 )] Pancreatitis [see Warnings and Precautions ( 5.2 )] Hypoglycemia with Concomitant Use of Insulin Secretagogues or Insulin [see Warnings and Precautions ( 5.3 )] Hypersensitivity Reactions [see Warnings and Precautions ( 5.4 )] Acute Kidney Injury [see Warnings and Precautions ( 5.5 )] Severe Gastrointestinal Disease [see Warnings and Precautions ( 5.6 )] Diabetic Retinopathy Complications in Patients with a History of Diabetic Retinopathy [see Warnings and Precautions ( 5.7 )] Acute Gallbladder Disease [see Warnings and Precautions ( 5.8 )] Most common adverse reactions (incidence ≥5%) are nausea, diarrhea, vomiting, abdominal pain, and decreased appetite ( 6.1 ). To report SUSPECTED ADVERSE REACTIONS, contact Eli Lilly and Company at 1-800-LillyRx (1-800-545-5979) or FDA at 1-800-FDA-1088 or www.fda.gov/medwatch . 6.1 Clinical Trials Experience Because clinical studies are conducted under widely varying conditions, adverse reaction rates observed in the clinical studies of a drug cannot be directly compared to rates in the clinical studies of another drug and may not reflect the rates observed in practice. Adverse Reactions in the Clinical Trials in Adults with Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus Pool of Adult…
Who shouldn’t take dulaglutide
TRULICITY is contraindicated in patients with: Personal or family history of medullary thyroid carcinoma (MTC) or in patients with Multiple Endocrine Neoplasia syndrome type 2 (MEN 2) [see Warnings and Precautions ( 5.1 )] . Serious hypersensitivity reaction to dulaglutide or to any of the product components. Serious hypersensitivity reactions including anaphylactic reactions and angioedema have been reported with TRULICITY [see Warnings and Precautions ( 5.4 )] . Patients with a personal or family history of medullary thyroid carcinoma or in patients with Multiple Endocrine Neoplasia syndrome type 2 ( 4 , 5.1 ). Patients with a serious hypersensitivity reaction to dulaglutide or any of the product components ( 4 , 5.4 ).
Dulaglutide drug interactions
Oral Medications: Delays gastric emptying and has the potential to reduce the rate of absorption of concomitantly administered oral medications ( 7.1 , 12.3 ). 7.1 Oral Medications TRULICITY delays gastric emptying and thus has the potential to reduce the rate of absorption of concomitantly administered oral medications. The delay in gastric emptying is dose-dependent but is attenuated with the recommended dose escalation to higher doses of TRULICITY [see Dosage and Administration ( 2.1 )] . The delay is largest after the first dose and diminishes with subsequent doses. In clinical pharmacology studies, TRULICITY 1.5 mg did not affect the absorption of the tested orally administered medications to a clinically relevant degree [see Clinical Pharmacology ( 12.3 )] . There is limited experience with the use of concomitant medications in clinical trials with TRULICITY doses of 3 mg and 4.5 mg. Monitor drug levels of oral medications with a narrow therapeutic index (e.g., warfarin) when concomitantly administered with TRULICITY. 7.2 Concomitant Use with an Insulin Secretagogue (e.g., Sulfonylurea) or with Insulin When initiating TRULICITY, consider reducing the dose of concomitantly administered insulin secretagogues (such as sulfonylureas) or insulin to reduce the risk of hypoglycemia [see Warnings and Precautions ( 5.3 ) and Adverse Reactions ( 6.1 )].
Every dulaglutide product we track (1)
Same active ingredient — different manufacturer, form, price and FDA recall record. That last one is what our independent score measures.
Only one: Trulicity.
Dulaglutide and breastfeeding
From LactMed, the US National Library of Medicine’s Drugs and Lactation Database — quoted, not rewritten.
Full LactMed record for dulaglutide: levels in milk, effects in breastfed infants, and the drugs it would consider insteadNo information is available on the clinical use of dulaglutide during breastfeeding. Because dulaglutide is a large protein molecule with a molecular weight of 59,669 daltons, the amount in milk is likely to be very low and absorption is unlikely because it is probably destroyed in the infant's gastrointestinal tract. Until more data become available, dulaglutide should be used with caution during breastfeeding, especially while nursing a newborn or preterm infant.
National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, record revised May 15, 2026. LactMed states its information is not a substitute for professional judgement.
What people report to the FDA about dulaglutide
The FDA Adverse Event Reporting System (FAERS) collects reports from patients and clinicians. It holds 2,300 reports naming dulaglutide, and the FDA flagged 82% of those reports as serious. The effects reported most often — leaving out reports about overdose, misuse or the condition being treated, which dominate the raw list for common medicines:
- nausea220 reports
- vomiting167 reports
- diarrhoea160 reports
- acute kidney injury147 reports
- dyspnoea116 reports
- blood glucose increased94 reports
- hyperglycaemia94 reports
- metabolic acidosis91 reports
Read these as a signal, not a rate. A report does not mean dulaglutide caused the effect — anyone can file one, and many describe people taking several medicines for several conditions. Crucially there is no denominator: FAERS does not record how many people took the drug, so these counts cannot be turned into “X% of patients” — a bigger number often just means a more widely used or more talked-about drug. Duplicates exist, and publicity drives reporting. For what is actually established, read the FDA label section above.
Source: openFDA drug/event (FAERS), retrieved July 25, 2026.
Related calculators
Frequently asked questions
What is dulaglutide?
Trulicity (Dulaglutide) is a medication used to treat Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus.
Can you take dulaglutide with other medicines?
It depends on the medicine. We check it against the FDA labels rather than guessing: our interaction checker searches each drug's own label for the other and quotes what it says, naming the section it came from. Run dulaglutide against whatever else you take — and remember that a label not naming a drug is not the same as that combination being safe.
What forms does dulaglutide come in?
Across the brands we track, dulaglutide is currently marketed as injectable, per the FDA's National Drug Code Directory. Each form is dosed differently — follow the label for the exact product you were prescribed.
Is there a generic dulaglutide?
We do not currently list a generic-labelled dulaglutide product. That does not always mean none exists — it means none appears under a generic name in the FDA data we track. Ask your pharmacist.
Cite this page
- APA
- pharmaranks. (2026, July 24). Dulaglutide: uses, dosing, side effects & brands. https://pharmaranks.com/drugs/dulaglutide
- MLA
- “Dulaglutide: uses, dosing, side effects & brands.” pharmaranks, 24 July 2026, https://pharmaranks.com/drugs/dulaglutide.
We summarise public FDA and NIH sources — for a clinical claim, cite the primary source we link to as well.
Sources: FDA openFDA drug label, National Drug Code Directory, and Enforcement (recall) database. This page reproduces public FDA data and is not medical advice. Dosing is set by your prescriber.
Read the full FDA label for dulaglutide on DailyMed (NIH) ↗ — including its boxed warning in full.