Injection site rotation: a simple way to keep track

Every weekly GLP-1 injection label asks for the same small habit: rotate your injection site. The US label for semaglutide (Ozempic®) puts it plainly: inject in the abdomen, thigh or upper arm, and use a different site each week when you inject in the same body region. The tirzepatide labels (Mounjaro®, Zepbound®) say to rotate sites with each dose too.

That's easy to agree with and surprisingly hard to do from memory. After a few weeks, the abdomen on the left and the abdomen on the right start to feel the same, and "I think I did my thigh last time" is about as precise as it gets. This guide shows a simple system that takes the guessing out.

What the labels say about sites

Every label lists the places it covers. For the weekly injections Hushweek follows, that's the abdomen, the thigh and the upper arm, with two differences. The US and UK tirzepatide labels (Mounjaro®, Zepbound®) describe the back of the upper arm as a site for another person to inject, and the Australian Mounjaro® label lists only the abdomen and the thigh. It's worth reading your own label's administration section once, because it's the source the rest of this guide builds on.

Hushweek follows the same lines. If you take tirzepatide on a US or UK label and someone else gives your injection, turn on Someone else injects for me in You › Medicine and schedule, or tap the link under the body map when you log a dose, and the back of each upper arm joins the sites you can log.

Your nurse, pharmacist or prescriber may have shown you particular spots or things to avoid. Their instructions come first. What follows is only a way to keep track of the spots you use.

The six-spot system

The simplest approach that works is to split the three body regions into left and right, which gives you six spots:

• Abdomen, left side and right side
• Left thigh and right thigh
• Left upper arm and right upper arm (if your label and your care team include it)

Each week, you use the spot that has gone longest without an injection. That's it. No calendar, no fixed order to memorize. If you skip arms, you simply have four spots instead of six, and the rule still works.

Why "rested longest" beats a fixed order

A fixed order (left belly, right belly, left thigh...) breaks the first time you need to skip a spot, say because of a bruise or because you're wearing something that makes your thigh awkward. You lose your place and the order unravels. "Rested longest" never breaks: whatever happened last week, the next choice is always clear.

Within a spot, move a little each time

Even inside one region, many people shift their injection point slightly from week to week, rather than going into exactly the same patch of skin. A light mental picture helps: think of each region as a small clock face and move round it. Your care team can tell you how much room you have and anything to avoid in your case.

What to note when something looks different

A log of sites is also the right place to note anything you noticed at a site afterwards. You don't need to describe it in medical terms; a few words are enough: "bit of a bruise", "itchy for a day". If something worries you or doesn't settle, talk to your pharmacist or prescriber. The point of the note is that you can tell them which site and which week, instead of trying to remember. In Hushweek, a few words in that dose's note (now, or later with Edit in History) keep it with the right week.

Keeping it on paper

If you prefer paper, draw a simple outline of a body on a card, mark your six spots and write the date beside each spot when you use it. Cross out the old date when you add a new one. The spot with the oldest date is next. Keep the card next to your pens.

Keeping it in an app

This is one place where an app is genuinely easier than paper, because it can do the "which is oldest" maths for you. In Hushweek, logging a dose opens a small body map with the zone that has rested longest already chosen. Tap a different one if you'd rather. The map splits each region into smaller zones (four on the abdomen and two on each thigh, plus the back of each upper arm where your label includes it), shades each one by how long it has rested, and tells you when you last used the one you pick. The site is kept with every dose, so the injection log and the rotation are the same record.

A quick rotation checklist

Questions people ask