HEOR News

Institute for Clinical and Economic Review Releases Draft Evidence Report on Treatments for Obesity (ICER)

The report concludes semaglutide and tirzepatide are cost-effective for obesity management in various healthcare settings—but with more than 92 million eligible patients in the United States and about 30,700,000 patients over 5 years initiating treatment with injectable or oral semaglutide or tirzepatide, this high demand will cause budget strain. ICER calculates the 5-year annualized potential budget impact threshold that should trigger policy actions to manage access and affordability is calculated to total approximately $880 million per year for new drugs.
Read more

WHO Updates List of Essential Medicines to Include Key Cancer, Diabetes Treatments (WHO)

Among the drugs added are pembrolizumab for metastatic cervical cancer, metastatic colorectal cancer, and metastatic non-small cell lung cancer. GLP-1 receptor agonists, semaglutide, dulaglutide, liraglutide, and tirzepatide, to treat diabetes were also added to the Essential Medicines List.
Read more

Prioritizing the Primary Prevention of Heart Failure (The Lancet)

The first of a series of 3 papers reviews the contemporary global epidemiology and pathophysiology of heart failure and proposes a comprehensive framework for screening to assess heart failure risk and detect pre-heart failure.
Read more

A Patient-Centered Pathway for Biomedical Innovation and Access (Health Affairs Forefront)

A unified data ecosystem between the US Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) is essential, and linking cost and outcomes data would allow CMS to refine payment policies and give manufacturers a clearer, evidence-based path toward approval and coverage that builds on collaborations while meeting post-approval commitments.
Read more

Real-World Efficacy and Safety of Trastuzumab Deruxtecan Versus Trastuzumab Emtansine and Tucatinib as Second-Line and Third-Line Treatments for HER2-Positive Metastatic Breast Cancer: Two Target Trial Emulation Studies (The Lancet Regional Health Europe)

Using the French National Health Data System, researchers emulated trastuzumab deruxtecan (T-DXd) versus trastuzumab emtansine (T-DM1) and T-DXd versus tucatinib, for second- and third-line HER2-positive metastatic breast cancer treatment and found that T-DXd was more effective than T-DM1 as a second-line treatment and tucatinib as a third-line treatment, in line with clinical trial results.
Read more

Global Inequities in Diabetes Technology and Insulin Access and Glycemic Outcomes (JAMA Network Open)

The cross-sectional study, which collated data regarding the accessibility and reimbursement of diabetes technologies and insulin from 81 centers across 56 countries, determined that there is significant global disparity and an association between glycemic outcomes and the accessibility of diabetes technologies and insulin.
Read more

Women, Older People, and Black People Less Likely to Receive an SGLT-2 Inhibitor Prescription for Type 2 Diabetes (NICE)

Only 1 in 5 people with atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease (ASCVD) received SGLT-2 prescriptions, and NICE’s analysis noted age- and gender-related disparities, with 32% of people aged 50 to 59 with ASCVD receiving prescriptions compared to just 13% of those aged 80-89 years, and men (35%) more likely to receive prescriptions than women (23%) among people with heart failure.
Read more

The Cost-Effectiveness of Tafenoquine Following Screening With STANDARD™ G6PD Screening for the Treatment of Vivax Malaria in the Brazilian Public Health System (The Lancet Regional Health Americas)

The use of tafenoquine on those who test G6PD normal with a semiquantitative test is a cost-effective strategy for the radical cure of vivax malaria in Brazil, researchers determined, saying the strategy was US$2894 (R$14,934) per disability-adjusted life-year averted compared to current practice, well below the willingness-to-pay threshold.
Read more

The Potential of Kidney Transplantation to Reduce Mortality From Chronic Kidney Disease: A Global, Cross-Sectional, Modeling Study (The Lancet Global Health)

Countries with higher kidney transplantation rates have lower mortality–prevalence ratios, regardless of gross domestic product per capita, and dialysis does not. As chronic kidney disease worsens and economic factors affect kidney transplantation rates, policy makers need to increase access to safe and ethical transplantation.
Read more

Patient and Physician Perceptions of Prostate-Specific Antigen Testing Among Black Individuals (JAMA Network Open)

The qualitative study found that primary care practitioners may not value prostate-specific antigen (PSA) testing for prostate cancer early detection or appreciate its role in reducing the risk of prostate cancer–related mortality. The results suggest that patients and practitioners need improved access to accurate and evidence-based information regarding prostate cancer risk and PSA testing among Black men.
Read more