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Compound monograph · evidence extract

Semaglutide, oral in obesity and overweight in adults — evidence extract

The Institute's graded assessment of Semaglutide, oral for obesity and overweight in adults, with the contributing trials and the domain-by-domain certainty reasoning.

Document identifier
CEI-MN-002/EV-OBESITY
Series
Evidence extract
Version
1.0
Published
28 Aug 2023
Last reviewed
28 Jun 2024
Next review
28 Jun 2026
Identifier
10.71829/cei.mono.2
Certainty
Moderate
Cycle
2023 Q3

§1Evidence extract: Obesity and overweight in adults

§1.1Question and anchor outcome

Population
Excess adiposity sufficient to impair health, operationalised in the pivotal incretin programmes as a body-mass index of 30 kg/m² or above, or 27 kg/m² or above with at least one weight-related comorbidity.
Intervention
Semaglutide, oral, oral once daily, fasted, with no more than 120 ml of water and at least 30 minutes before other intake
Comparator
As used in each contributing trial; reported per trial rather than pooled across comparator types
Anchor outcome
Percentage change in body weight from baseline

Additional outcomes the Institute extracts for this indication: Proportion achieving ≥5 %, ≥10 %, ≥15 % and ≥20 % weight reduction; Change in waist circumference; Change in systolic blood pressure; Change in high-sensitivity C-reactive protein.

§1.2Contributing trials

Table 1. Trials contributing to the assessment of Semaglutide, oral in obesity and overweight in adults.

TrialPhaseDesignRandomisedDurationYear
OASIS-13Randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled66768 weeks2023

§1.3Certainty assessment

Certainty assessment by domainDowngrading decision recorded for each certainty domain.Certainty domainNo concernSeriousVery seriousEffect on ratingRisk of biasno downgradeInconsistencyno downgradeIndirectnessno downgradeImprecisiondowngrade one levelPublication biasno downgradeTotal downgrading: 1 levelModerate certainty
Figure 2. Domain-by-domain certainty assessment for Semaglutide, oral in obesity and overweight in adults. The starting rating for a body of randomised evidence is high; each serious concern reduces it by one level and each very serious concern by two.

Table 2. Reasoning recorded against each certainty domain.

DomainRatingReasoning
Risk of biasNo concernNo serious concern identified in this domain.
InconsistencyNo concernNo serious concern identified in this domain.
IndirectnessNo concernNo serious concern identified in this domain.
ImprecisionSeriousThe event count falls below the optimal information size.
Publication biasNo concernNo serious concern identified in this domain.
Overall rating: Moderate certainty. The true effect is likely to be close to the estimate, but there is a possibility that it is substantially different. Further research is likely to have an important impact on confidence in the estimate.

§1.4What this extract does not establish

References cited on this page

References are numbered in order of first citation in this document. Each superscript in the text links to its entry below.

  1. Husain M, Birkenfeld AL, Donsmark M, Dungan K, Eliaschewitz FG, Franco DR, Jeppesen OK, Lingvay I, Mosenzon O, Pedersen SD, Tack CJ, Thomsen M, Vilsbøll T, Warren ML, Bain SC. Oral semaglutide and cardiovascular outcomes in patients with type 2 diabetes. New England Journal of Medicine 2019;381(9):841–851. doi:10.1056/NEJMoa1901118 · PMID 31185157
  2. Aroda VR, Rosenstock J, Terauchi Y, Altuntas Y, Lalic NM, Morales Villegas EC, Jeppesen OK, Christiansen E, Hertz CL, Haluzík M. PIONEER 1: randomized clinical trial of the efficacy and safety of oral semaglutide monotherapy in comparison with placebo in patients with type 2 diabetes. Diabetes Care 2019;42(9):1724–1732. doi:10.2337/dc19-0749 · PMID 31186300
  3. Knop FK, Aroda VR, do Vale RD, Holst-Hansen T, Laursen PN, Rosenstock J, Rubino DM, Garvey WT. Oral semaglutide 50 mg taken once per day in adults with overweight or obesity (OASIS 1): a randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled, phase 3 trial. The Lancet 2023;402(10403):705–719. doi:10.1016/S0140-6736(23)01185-6 · PMID 37364590

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