Cost-Effectiveness of Biological Asthma Treatments: A Systematic Review and Recommendations for Future Economic Evaluations

R. Brett McQueen (), Danielle N. Sheehan, Melanie D. Whittington, Job F. M. Boven and Jonathan D. Campbell
Additional contact information
R. Brett McQueen: University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus
Danielle N. Sheehan: University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus
Melanie D. Whittington: University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus
Job F. M. Boven: University of Groningen
Jonathan D. Campbell: University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus

PharmacoEconomics, 2018, vol. 36, issue 8, No 7, 957-971

Abstract: Abstract Background Recently developed asthma biological therapies have been shown to provide relief for severe asthma patients not controlled by inhaled treatment. Given the relatively high costs of biological therapies, cost-effectiveness analyses (CEAs) may be required as a prerequisite for coverage and reimbursement. Objective We aimed to systematically review published literature on the economic impact of biological asthma therapies and to identify key drivers that impact cost-effectiveness in order to provide recommendations for future economic evaluations. Methods We conducted a systematic literature search in PubMed and Google Scholar. We included studies that assessed the cost-effectiveness of asthma biologics and were published in English between 2000 and 2018. The Quality of Health Economic Studies (QHES) instrument was used to evaluate quality. Results Twenty asthma biological CEAs were identified. Nineteen studies analyzed the cost-effectiveness of omalizumab, and one study analyzed mepolizumab. Ten studies concluded that omalizumab was cost-effective in base-case scenarios, four studies concluded omalizumab was not cost-effective, and the remaining studies concluded omalizumab or mepolizumab was cost-effective only when targeted to specific severe subgroups or given considerable price discounts. Key drivers of cost-effectiveness included day-to-day health-related quality of life (HRQoL), asthma-related mortality, acquisition price of the biological therapy, and time horizon. Conclusions Most studies recommended carefully targeting biological therapy to specific populations such as responders or discounting acquisition price in order to further improve value. The quality of the studies was generally satisfactory, but improved evidence is needed linking HRQoL to utilities as well as understanding interventions’ impact on asthma-related mortality. Key recommendations from this review may allow for greater comparability across future cost-effectiveness studies.

Date: 2018
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s40273-018-0658-x Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:pharme:v:36:y:2018:i:8:d:10.1007_s40273-018-0658-x

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer.com/economics/journal/40273

DOI: 10.1007/s40273-018-0658-x

Access Statistics for this article

PharmacoEconomics is currently edited by Timothy Wrightson and Christopher I. Carswell

More articles in PharmacoEconomics from Springer
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().