Retatrutide in obesity and overweight in adults: effect on the anchor outcome
In the population defined for obesity and overweight in adults, what is the effect of Retatrutide compared with the comparator used in its contributing trials on the anchor outcome for this indication?
Templated review frame. This review question was generated by crossing an indication with a compound for which contributing trials exist. Its prose frame is templated and is shared with other questions of the same shape. Its included studies, its summary of findings and its certainty rating are computed from the underlying records and are not templated. The Institute publishes these questions because the alternative is to leave a question the document set can answer unanswered, and it labels them because the alternative is to present a templated frame as an authored one.
§1Abstract
§1.1Review question
In the population defined for obesity and overweight in adults, what is the effect of Retatrutide compared with the comparator used in its contributing trials on the anchor outcome for this indication?
§1.2PICO frame
Table 1. The registered PICO frame. Any change made after protocol registration is recorded in the amendment log at §5 and is identified there as post hoc.
| Element | As registered |
|---|---|
| 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 | Retatrutide administered as subcutaneous once weekly. |
| Comparator | The comparator used in each contributing trial, reported per trial rather than pooled across comparator types. |
| Outcomes | Anchor outcome for this indication: Percentage change in body weight from baseline. Additional outcomes: Proportion achieving ≥5 %, ≥10 %, ≥15 % and ≥20 % weight reduction; Change in waist circumference; Change in systolic blood pressure. |
§1.3Method in brief
A review of the effects of an intervention on pre-specified outcomes, with a quantitative synthesis where the contributing studies are sufficiently similar. The protocol was registered with the Institute's secretariat before the search was executed. The search was run on 11 November 2024 across 8 sources and is reproduced in full at §2. Screening, extraction and certainty assessment were performed independently by two members of the secretariat with disagreement resolved by a third.[1,2]
§1.4Conclusion
Moderate certainty evidence from 5 contributing trials bears on the effect of Retatrutide on the anchor outcome for obesity and overweight in adults. The estimate the Institute carries in the monograph is: −24.2 % body weight at 48 weeks with 12 mg in the phase 2 trial versus −2.1 % with placebo. The largest weight effect reported for any single agent, but from a phase 2 trial of 338 participants. Downgraded from high for indirectness of dose and imprecision at the extremes; phase 3 confirmation was pending at this assessment cycle.
The conclusion rests on 5 contributing studies, listed with their extracted data at §3 and summarised outcome by outcome at §4.
§1.5Limitations
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.
- Jastreboff AM, Kaplan LM, Frías JP, Wu Q, Du Y, Gurbuz S, Coskun T, Haupt A, Milicevic Z, Hartman ML. Triple-hormone-receptor agonist retatrutide for obesity — a phase 2 trial. New England Journal of Medicine 2023;389(6):514–526. doi:10.1056/NEJMoa2301972 · PMID 37366315
- Rosenstock J, Frias J, Jastreboff AM, Du Y, Lou J, Gurbuz S, Thomas MK, Hartman ML, Haupt A, Milicevic Z, Coskun T. Retatrutide, a GIP, GLP-1 and glucagon receptor agonist, for people with type 2 diabetes: a randomised, double-blind, placebo- and active-controlled, parallel-group, phase 2 trial. The Lancet 2023;402(10401):529–544. doi:10.1016/S0140-6736(23)01053-X · PMID 37385280
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