OBJECTIVES: An independent study was recently published by Post (2023) on the time to reimbursement (TTR) of novel anti-cancer medicines in six European countries: Belgium, Germany, France, the Netherlands, Norway, Switzerland, and the UK. With the exception of Germany, these countries were selected because they follow a comparable national reimbursement process including the submission of a clinical and cost-effectiveness dossier, evaluation by an expert committee, followed by price negotiations. We extended this study to include Ireland because Ireland has a similar reimbursement process. Submissions in Ireland are evaluated by the National Centre for Pharmacoeconomics (NCPE) and reimbursement is officially triggered by the submission of a Rapid Review (RR).

METHODS: We abstracted the 35 novel anti-cancer medicines included in the Post (2023) analysis from our database which includes all drugs evaluated by the NCPE along with reimbursement timelines. Two TTR measures were estimated: from EMA approval to reimbursement (TTR_E) consistent with the Post (2023) analysis and from RR submission to reimbursement (TTR_rr).

RESULTS: 22 of the 35 (63%) medicines were reimbursed in Ireland. This compares to a median reimbursement rate of 80% across the seven countries. Only Belgium had a lower reimbursement rate than Ireland at 60%. Median TTR_E in Ireland was 693 days which compares to a median TTR_E of 234 across the seven countries. Only Belgium had longer TTR_E than Ireland with a median TTR of 742 days. Median TTR_rr was 570 days in Ireland, placing Ireland ahead of Belgium, Switzerland and Norway.

CONCLUSIONS: This study confirms previous analysis showing Ireland lagging behind other European countries in terms of access to oncology medicines using TTR_E. However, Ireland’s ranking improves when arguably the more accurate TTR_rr measure is used.