Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2025 Sep;33(9):1645-1656.
doi: 10.1002/oby.24332. Epub 2025 Jun 22.

Tirzepatide for reduction of morbidity and mortality in adults with obesity: rationale and design of the SURMOUNT-MMO trial

Carolyn S P Lam  1   2 , Angel Rodriguez  3 , Ali Aminian  4 , Ele Ferrannini  5 , Hiddo J L Heerspink  6   7 , Ania M Jastreboff  8 , Luke J Laffin  9 , Ambarish Pandey  10 , Kausik K Ray  11 , Paul M Ridker  12 , Arun J Sanyal  13 , Hannele Yki-Jarvinen  14   15 , Denise Mason  16 , Michelle Strzelecki  16 , Amy K Bartee  3 , Can Cui  3 , Karla Hurt  3 , Bruno Linetzky  3 , Mathijs C Bunck  3 , Steven E Nissen  17
Affiliations

Tirzepatide for reduction of morbidity and mortality in adults with obesity: rationale and design of the SURMOUNT-MMO trial

Carolyn S P Lam et al. Obesity (Silver Spring). 2025 Sep.

Abstract

Objective: Obesity is a major cause of morbidity and mortality worldwide. Tirzepatide is a glucose-dependent insulinotropic polypeptide receptor and glucagon-like peptide-1 receptor agonist providing substantial weight reduction and metabolic benefits both in type 2 diabetes and obesity. We hypothesized that tirzepatide can improve morbidity and mortality in adults with obesity or overweight but without diabetes.

Methods: SURMOUNT-MMO is a randomized, double-blind, event-driven trial to investigate the impact on morbidity and mortality with once-weekly tirzepatide compared with placebo in adults living with obesity, without diabetes, and with, or at risk of, cardiovascular disease. The primary endpoint is time to first occurrence of a five-component composite outcome of nonfatal myocardial infarction, nonfatal stroke, coronary revascularization, heart failure events, or death from any cause.

Results: The trial will enroll ~15,000 participants aged ≥40 from 664 sites across 27 countries with BMI ≥27.0 kg/m2 and either established cardiovascular disease or multiple cardiovascular risk factors.

Conclusions: SURMOUNT-MMO will provide evidence of the clinical benefits of tirzepatide on multiple outcomes among individuals with overweight or obesity but without diabetes. This is the first outcome trial of an incretin medication that assesses both primary and secondary cardiovascular disease prevention.

PubMed Disclaimer

References

REFERENCES

    1. GBD. 2015 Obesity Collaborators; Afshin A, Forouzanfar MH, Reitsma MB, et al. Health effects of overweight and obesity in 195 countries over 25 years. N Engl J Med. 2017;377(1):13‐27.
    1. Bhaskaran K, Dos‐Santos‐Silva I, Leon DA, Douglas IJ, Smeeth L. Association of BMI with overall and cause‐specific mortality: a population‐based cohort study of 3.6 million adults in the UK. Lancet Diabetes Endocrinol. 2018;6(12):944‐953.
    1. Khan SS, Ning H, Wilkins JT, et al. Association of body mass index with lifetime risk of cardiovascular disease and compression of morbidity. JAMA Cardiol. 2018;3(4):280‐287.
    1. Sarma S, Sockalingam S, Dash S. Obesity as a multisystem disease: trends in obesity rates and obesity‐related complications. Diabetes Obes Metab. 2021;23(suppl 1):3‐16.
    1. Garofalo C, Borrelli S, Minutolo R, Chiodini P, De Nicola L, Conte G. A systematic review and meta‐analysis suggests obesity predicts onset of chronic kidney disease in the general population. Kidney Int. 2017;91(5):1224‐1235.

Publication types

Grants and funding

LinkOut - more resources