Published Jun 23, 2014

Basel, Switzerland - Many new products for type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) will be launched in the coming years as a response to this ever-increasing world epidemic. Health technology assessment (HTA) agencies require cost-effectiveness studies of these agents, but no consistent set of utility data exists to act as a basis for these evaluations. Researchers from IMS Health and Swansea University aimed to report a set of utility values for T2DM and its complications to illustrate challenges in creating such a utility set. In the study “Review of Utility Values for Economic Modeling in Type 2 Diabetes,” published inValue in Health, the researchers reported a set of values that might act as a common benchmark for assessing new diabetes treatments. Several limitations were observed in selecting values for inclusion in economic evaluations including the use of different instruments to measure preferences, the variability in patient recruitment, heterogeneity in statistical analysis, large variability around some point estimates and lack of recent data. This highlights the need for further research and guidance for the selection of utilities for use in cost-effectiveness analyses. Adam Lloyd, MPhil, Senior Principal at IMS Health and co-author of the manuscript, said, “Evaluations of new diabetes therapy are inconsistent, because many estimates of patient outcomes are incomplete or do not meet the requirements of HTA agencies. Understanding long-term benefits is crucial to establishing whether new diabetes treatments offer good value for money. The use of a common set of inputs for different technologies might lead to greater consistency in evaluation of new therapies.”

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