How to read a phase 2 result without treating it as a phase 3 result

The question in the title: How to read a phase 2 result without treating it as a phase 3 result I will give what I have already checked below so nobody repeats it.

Session topic: FLOW (N Engl J Med, 2024). Please read it before posting; the discussion is much better when everyone has.

The question I would like us to start with is what the trial set out to estimate, rather than what it found. Once that is on the table we can talk about whether the design could have answered it, and only then about the numbers.

Specific things I would like covered: the population and how far it generalises, how discontinuation was handled, whether the comparator was a fair one, and what the absolute rather than relative effect looks like.

I will summarise at the end and the summary will feed the relevant digest page.

Retatrutide is investigational. Anything obtained outside a trial is by definition research-use-only material with no human-use authorisation. This site will state that plainly rather than winking at it.

On post #10 — agreed on the reasoning, with one qualification.

Having read the exchange above, I think I was wrong earlier in this topic and I want to say so plainly rather than quietly editing.

The correction was fair and I had been repeating something I had not checked carefully enough.

Mass and identity: a report on retatrutide should state the mass detected by LC-MS, not assume a theoretical mass. The theoretical mass is not published in peer-reviewed literature for retatrutide at present.

Retatrutide is investigational. Anything obtained outside a trial is by definition research-use-only material with no human-use authorisation. This site will state that plainly rather than winking at it.

Two things before anyone answers the substance.

First, the context in the first post is clear and specific. Second, the question is framed so that an answer can actually address it. Both are the norm here and both matter more than they sound.