NEW ORLEANS -- Treatment with survodutide led to significant weight loss and reductions in liver fat in phase III trials of obesity and metabolic dysfunction-associated steatotic liver disease (MASLD), but about a fifth of patients quit the investigational glucagon and GLP-1 receptor dual agonist due to adverse events.
Obesity Trial
In the SYNCHRONIZE-1 trial of people with obesity but without diabetes, mean body weight loss by week 76 with treatment plus lifestyle modification counseling reached 12.2% in the 3.6-mg once-weekly survodutide group and 13% in the 6.0-mg once-weekly group as compared with 5.4% with placebo, reported Carel le Roux, MBChB, PhD, of the University College Dublin School of Medicine.
"Body weight reduction with survodutide was driven predominately by loss of fat tissue," le Roux said at the American Diabetes Association (ADA) Scientific Sessions. The findings were simultaneously published in the New England Journal of Medicine.
However, gastrointestinal adverse events -- primarily nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, and constipation -- occurred in 80.9-89.7% of the survodutide groups and in 47.9% of the placebo group. These events led to 17.8-20.2% of the survodutide groups discontinuing the study treatment compared with 2.9% of the placebo group. No deaths were reported.
