josh_phd_bmore said:

One habit that pays for itself: post the method alongside the number.

I read this differently from josh_phd_bmore, on substance rather than tone. Pushing back on the consensus forming here. Consistency is not the same as correctness, and a board that agrees with itself quickly is usually agreeing with the first person who sounded certain.

josh_phd_bmore said:

One habit that pays for itself: post the method alongside the number.

Agreed on the substance. I would put less weight on the timescale, because two months of anything is not enough to distinguish a trend from a wobble.

josh_phd_bmore said:

One habit that pays for itself: post the method alongside the number.

Thank you — that is the clearest version of this I have read, and I have read a lot of them. Printing the relevant bit and taking it with me.

Adding the clinical framing, because it changes how the question reads. The mechanism and the magnitude are separate questions. Agreeing that something happens says nothing about whether it happens enough to act on.

Closing the loop on my own question.

Update — my curve sits below the published mean and the explanation is that the trial arm had support I do not have. That was reassuring rather than otherwise.