OBJECTIVES: To investigate the health utilities of persons with diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL).

METHODS: DLBCL patients were identified via a patient group and were surveyed online. Five-level EuroQol five-dimensional questionnaire (EQ-5D-5L) and Short-Form 6-Dimension Version2 (SF-6D-V2) were delivered to investigate the health utilities associated with DLBCL patients. EQ-5D-5L and SF-6D-V2 responses were converted to utility values using Chinese-specific value sets.

RESULTS: In total, 582 valid responses were collected during September 9 and November 3, 2022. Among these interviewees, 477 were first-line treatment patients and 105 were patients with relapsed/refractory DLBCL (RR-DLBCL). Overall, for the first-line treatment patients, the mean [standard deviation(SD)] EQ-5D-5L utility score was 0.84 (0.21), whereas the mean SF-6D-V2 utility score was 0.65 (0.21). For the patients with RR-DLBCL, the mean EQ-5D-5L utility score was 0.77 (0.26) and the mean SF-6D-V2 utility score was 0.59 (0.24). The proportion of the first-line treatment DLBCL patients reporting "no problem" to the five EQ-5D-5L questions were 75.26%, 85.95%, 79.25%, 41.51% and 29.98%, respectively. The corresponding numbers among patients with RR-DLBCL were 66.67%, 81.90%, 67.62%, 29.52% and 26.67%. By contrast, the proportion of the highest-level functioning responses to the six SF-6D-V2 questions among the first-line treatment DLBCL patients were 10.27%, 14.26%, 17.19%, 37.32%, 15.30% and 6.50%, respectively. The corresponding numbers among patients with RR-DLBCL were 7.62%, 10.48%, 9.52%, 39.05%, 11.43% and 5.71%.

CONCLUSIONS: DLBCL patients in China experience impaired health utilities, which were especially low among the RR-DLBCL patients. Also, EQ-5D-5L is subject to stronger ceiling effects than SF-6D-V2 among DLBCL patients in China.