Objective To systematically evaluate the pharmacoeconomic vaule of chemotherapy combined with rituximab for patients with non-Hodgkin’s lymphomas (NHL). Methods A systematic literature search of cost-effectiveness studies on rituximab treating NHL published from 1998 to 2012 was carried out in following databases: PubMed, ScienceDirect, Health Technology Assessment (HTA) and Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews (CDSR). And the references of included studies were also retrieved manually. The studies were screened according to the pre-designed inclusion and exclusion criteria, and the incremental cost- effectiveness ratio (ICER) in comparison between chemotherapy plus rituximab and chemotherapy alone was systematically evaluated according to the literature evaluation index system. Results The average ICER of Rituximab treating NHL was 16 318/QALY, 17 688/QALY, and 22 461/QALY in the UK, Mainland Europe, and US, respectively. All the reported ICERs in the included studies were below the implemented country-specific thresholds. Conclusion Based on present foreign literature, the integrated therapy of chemotherapy and rituximab for NHL is supposed to be a better cost-effective therapy with ICER below the implemented country-specific thresholds.
Objective To investigate the clinical features of non-gastrointestinal mucosa-associated lymphoid tissue ( MALT) lymphoma.Methods Forty-eight pathologically proved cases of nongastrointestinal MALT lymphoma, admitted into Peking Union Medical College Hospital fromJanuary 2000 to July 2011, were retrospectively analyzed.Results There were 32 females and 16 males. The median age at diagnosis was 55. 4 years old ( range, 21-76 years) . The most commonly affected sites were lung, salivary glands, thyroid and ocular adnexa. In5 cases, the lymphoma presented at multiple mucosal sites. 27 patients were asymptomatic while 13 had non-specific symptoms. Blood test showed mild or moderate anemia in 8 cases, elevated erythrocyte sedimentation rate in 19 cases, and elevated lactate dehydrogenase in 6 patients.Imaging examinations revealed enlarged lymph nodes in 20 patients. 6 patients had a history of Sjoren’s syndrome, in whom3 cases were salivary gland diseases. In the patients with lung involvement, pathological diagnosis was obtained by bronchial biopsies in 3 cases, by CT-guided percutaneous lung biopsies in 11 cases, and by surgical biopsies in 9 cases. While in the patients without lung involvement, pathological diagnosis was obtained all by surgical biopsies. Of the 23 patients with lung involvement, 1 remain untreated,while 22 received various combinations of treatment ( surgery alone in 3 patients, surgery plus chemotherapy in 6 patients, and chemotherapy alone in 13 patients) . Of the 25 patients without lung involvement, 11 patients received surgery alone, 10 patients received surgery plus chemotherapy, 3 patients received chemotherapy alone, and 1 patient received surgery plus chemotherapy and radiotherapy. 46 patients remained alive during the median follow-up of 46. 7 months ( range, 4-133 months) . While 1 patient with lung involvement died from unknown causes, another 1 patient with lung involvement died from lung infection. Conclusions Non-gastrointestinal MALT lymphoma tends to occur in old-aged females, and commonly occurs in lung, salivary gland and thyroid sites. Most patients are asymptomatic or have only nonspecific symptoms. CT-guided percutaneous lung biopsies and surgical biopsies are helpful to the diagnosis.Prognosis for this lymphoma tends to be indolent.