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 explore the effects on quality of life (QOL), the targeted rates of metabolic parameters and cost-effectiveness in newly diagnosed type 2 diabetic patients who underwent multifactorial intensive intervention. Methods One hundred and twenty seven cases in an intensive intervention and 125 cases in a conventional intervention group were investigated by using the SF-36 questionnaire. The comparison of QOL and the targeted rates of metabolic parameters between the two groups were made. We assessed the influence factors of QOL by stepwise regression analysis and evaluated the efficiency by pharmacoeconomic cost-effectiveness analysis. Results The targeted rates of blood glucose, blood lipid and blood pressure with intensive policies were significantly higher than those with conventional policy (P＜0.05). The intensive group’s role limitations due to physical problems (RP), general health (GH), vitality (VT), role limitation due to emotional problems (RE) and total scores after 6 months intervention were significantly higher than those of baseline (P＜0.05). The vitality scores and health transition (HT) of the intensive group were better than those of the conventional group after 6 months intervention. But the QOL scores of the conventional group were not improved after intervention. The difference of QOL’s total scores after intervention was related to that of HbA1c. The total cost-effectiveness rate of blood glucose, blood lipid, blood pressure control and the total cost-effectiveness rate of QOL with intensive policy were higher than those with the conventional policy. Conclusions Quality of life and the targeted rates of blood glucose, blood lipid and blood pressure in newly diagnosed type 2 diabetic patients with multifactorial intensive intervention policy are better and more economic than those with conventional policy.
ObjectiveTo systematically review the effectiveness and safety of salvianolate injection and Danshen injection for patients with angina pectoris, and evaluate the cost of drug. MethodsWe electronically searched databases including PubMed, CENTRAL (Issue 4, 2013), CNKI, VIP and WanFang Data (2004.1 to 2013.5) for the randomized controlled trials (RCTs) on the comparison between salvianolate injection and Danshen injection for angina pectoris from January 2004 to May 2013. Relevant journals and conference proceedings were also manually retrieved. Two reviewers independently screened literature in accordance with the inclusion and exclusion criteria, extracted the data and assess the methodological quality of included studies. Then, meta-analysis was performed using RevMan 5.2 software. ResultsA total of 10 RCTs involving 1 196 patients were included. The results of meta-analysis showed that, salvianolate injection was obviously superior to Danshen injection in the effectiveness (OR=3.79, 95%CI 2.78 to 5.17, P < 0.000 01) and safety (OR=0.24, 95%CI 0.09 to 0.64, P=0.004), but lack of economic advantages in the treatment of the angina pectoris diseases. ConclusionCurrent evidence indicates that, salvianolate injection is a safe and effective scheme for angina pectoris, and Danshen injection is considered as a economic method. Because of the limited quantity and quality of currently-available research, the aforementioned conclusion should be verified by strictly-designed and large-scale sample RCTs.
ObjectiveTo systematically evaluate the pharmacoeconomic value of radiofrequency ablation (RFA) versus amiodarone in the treatment of atrial fibrillation (AF), and to provide reference for treatment scheme selection, drug selection and the formulation of drug policy. MethodsWe searched databases including PubMed, The Cochrane Library, CNKI and CBM from 2000 to 2014 to collect pharmacoeconomic studies on RFA versus Amiodarone for treating AF. Two reviewers independently screened literature, extracted data, and assessed the methodological quality of included studies. The cost-effectiveness of RFA and Amiodarone for AF was compared according to the cost, effectiveness, and incremental cost-effectiveness ratio (ICER). ResultsA total of three studies were included. The results of pharmacoeconomic evaluation showed that the ICERs for each study were $7 976 to $29 068, ￡7 763 to ￡27 745, and $59 194, respectively. According to country-specific willingness to pay thresholds, the ICER of each included study was acceptable. ConclusionCompared to Amiodarone, RFA is a cost-effective therapy for AF.
Health economics analysis has become increasingly important in recent years. It is essential to master the use of relevant software to conduct research in health economics. TreeAge Pro software is widely used in the healthcare decision analysis. It can carry out decision analysis, cost-effectiveness analysis, and Monte Carlo simulation. With powerful functionlity and outstanding visualization, it can build Markov disease transition models to analyze Markov processes according to disease models and accomplish decision analysis with decision trees and influence diagrams. This paper introduces cost-effectiveness analysis based on Markov model with examples and explains the main graphs.
Markov model is one of the decision analysis models, which is widely used in pharmacoeconomic evaluation studies. In terms of dealing with changes of disease risks during different times, the transition probabilities among different Markov health states becomes hard to calculate. Nevertheless, survival analysis is an available resolution. In this paper, we introduced how to apply survival analysis in calculation of transition probability in time-dependent model based on cumulative probability with a case analysis on advanced gastric cancer Markov model, and provide more information for researchers to build models.
ObjectivesTo review the pharmacoeconomic evaluation of rheumatoid arthritis patients with an inadequate efficacy or intolerance with conventional synthetic disease modifying antirheumatic drugs (csDMARDs).MethodsCNKI, WanFang Data, VIP, PubMed, EMbase, Web of Science and The Cochrane Library were electronically searched to collect pharmacoeconomic studies about rheumatoid arthritis patients with an inadequate efficacy or intolerance with csDMARDs from inception to February 2019. Two reviewers independently screened literature, extracted data and assessed risk of bias of the included studies, then, descriptive analysis was performed.ResultsA total of 16 studies were included, where most compared the economics of different treatment methods from the perspective of the payer by cohort or individual model. The economic costs in the studies were primarily on direct cost. Sensitivity analyses were used to prove the robustness of the main analysis in each study. Biological disease-modifying antirheumatic drugs (bDMARDs) might be more cost-effective than csDMARDs. In addition, compared with the bDMARDs, new-marketed targeted synthetic disease-modifying antirheumatic drugs (tsDMARDs) might be more cost-effective.ConclusionsIt could be considered to implement more new marketed tsDMARDs to improve patients’ condition to reduce the economic burden and optimize the allocation of health care resources.
As an important auxiliary means of pharmacoeconomics evaluation, budget impact analysis can effectively measure the affordability of medical insurance fund, and plays a significant role in the process of medical insurance access negotiation, adjustment of medical insurance reimbursement directory and establishment of payment price. The quality of budget impact analysis data has a great impact on the analysis results and the scientific decision-making. When the existing data cannot meet the requirements of the paper, relevant software is needed to carry out Delphi method to ensure the data accuracy. Infopoll is a powerful, easy-to-use application that designs consultation questionnaires by providing multiple question choices and multiple forms of answer settings, as well as detailed statistical charts for results analysis. This paper introduces how to obtain the data of budget impact analysis based on Delphi method using Infopoll software, and analyzes the main results in detail.
ObjectiveTo systematically review the pharmacoeconomics of high-dose intravenous iron ferric carboxymaltose in the treatment of patients with iron deficiency anemia. MethodsPharmacoeconomic studies of ferric carboxymaltose in the treatment of patients with iron deficiency anemia were searched in PubMed, The Cochrane Library, York University CRD, Web of Science, EBSCO, CNKI, WanFang Data and VIP databases, and relevant health technology assessment websites from inception to September 30th, 2021. A descriptive analysis was performed after two reviewers independently screened the literature, extracted data, and assessed the risk of bias of the included studies. ResultsA total of 11 studies were included, most of them compared the health economics of ferric carboxymaltose with other therapies from a hospital perspective. The main costs included in these studies were costs for iron, infusion, blood transfusion, EPO, hospitalization, and transportation, as well as productivity cost. The ferric carboxymaltose was presumed to be more economical than other intravenous irons. ConclusionIt is suggested that the ferric carboxymaltose be considered in more clinical settings to improve the ischemic condition of patients with iron deficiency anemia, so as to promote the rational utilization of medical resources.
ObjectiveTo introduce economic evaluation methods for anticancer-drugs with basket trial design, and to provide references for related research and decision-making. MethodsA case analysis was conducted on economic evaluation methods for anticancer-drugs with basket trial design, which was issued by Canadian Agency for Drugs and Technologies in Health (CADTH) in the Economic Guidance Report. Moreover, both the advantages and disadvantages of the methods were analyzed in accordance with the characteristics of basket trials. ResultsPooled analysis and tumor-specific analysis were two methods frequently employed in the case analysis. However, great uncertainties were available in both of them. The uncertainty of the former was mainly reflected in the heterogeneity of the targeted population, while the uncertainty of the latter was mainly shown in the insufficient sample size of the subgroup. ConclusionCurrently, economic evaluation methods for anticancer-drugs with basket trial design are immature. Thus, researchers are required to explore the methods of innovation evaluation with lower uncertainty; reimbursement decision-makers should fully consider the uncertainty of evaluation results and enterprises should collect the real-world data for the demands of evaluation to promote the reasonable allocation of healthcare resources in China.