Every Monday our authors provide a round-up of some of the most recently published peer reviewed articles from the field. We don’t cover everything, or even what’s most important – just a few papers that have interested the author. Visit our Resources page for links to more journals or follow the HealthEconBot. If you’d like to write one of our weekly journal round-ups, get in touch.
A longitudinal study to assess the frequency and cost of antivascular endothelial therapy, and inequalities in access, in England between 2005 and 2015. BMJ Open [PubMed] Published 22nd October 2017
I am breaking one of my unwritten rules in a journal paper round-up by talking about colleagues’ work, but I feel it is too important not to provide a summary for a number of reasons. The study highlights the problems faced by regional healthcare purchasers in England when implementing national guideline recommendations on the cost-effectiveness of new treatments. The paper focuses on anti-vascular endothelial growth factor (anti-VEGF) medicines in particular, with two drugs, ranibizumab and aflibercept, offered to patients with a range of eye conditions, costing £550-800 per injection. Another drug, bevacizumab, that is closely related to ranibizumab and performs similarly in trials, could be provided at a fraction of the cost (£50-100 per injection), but it is currently unlicensed for eye conditions in the UK. This study investigates how the regional areas in England have coped with trying to provide the recommended drugs using administrative data from Hospital Episode Statistics in England between 2005-2015 by tracking their use since they have been recommended for a number of different eye conditions over the past decade. In 2014/15 the cost of these two new drugs for treating eye conditions alone was estimated at £447 million nationally. The distribution of where these drugs are provided is not equal, varying widely across regions after controlling for socio-demographics, suggesting an inequality of access associated with the introduction of these high-cost drugs over the past decade at a time of relatively low growth in national health spending. Although there are limitations associated with using data not intended for research purposes, the study shows how the most can be made from data routinely collected for non-research purposes. On a public policy level, it raises questions over the provision of such high-cost drugs, for which the authors state the NHS are currently paying more for than US insurers. Although it is important to be careful when comparing to unlicensed drugs, the authors point to clear evidence in the paper as to why their comparison is a reasonable one in this scenario, with a large opportunity cost associated with not including this option in national guidelines. If national recommendations continue to insist that such drugs be provided, clearer guidance is also required on how to disinvest from existing services at a regional level to reduce further examples of inequality in access in the future.
In search of a common currency: a comparison of seven EQ-5D-5L value sets. Health Economics [PubMed] Published 24th October 2017
For those of us out there who like a good valuation study, you will need to set yourself aside a good piece of time to work your way through this one. The new EQ-5D-5L measure of health status, with a primary purpose of generating quality-adjusted life years (QALYs) for economic evaluations, is now starting to have valuation studies emerging from different countries, whereby the relative importance of each of the measure dimensions and levels are quantified based on general population preferences. This study offers the first comparison of value sets across seven countries: 3 Western European (England, Netherlands, Spain), 1 North American (Canada), 1 South American (Uruguay), and two East Asian (Japan and South Korea). The authors in this paper aim to describe methodological differences between the seven value sets, compare the relative importance of dimensions, level decrements and scale length (i.e. quality/quantity trade-offs for QALYs), as well as developing a common (Western) currency across four of the value sets. In brief summary, there does appear to be similar trends across the three Western European countries: level decrements from levels 3 to 4 have the largest value, followed by levels 1 to 2. There is also a pattern in these three countries’ dimensions, whereby the two “symptom” dimensions (i.e. pain/discomfort, anxiety/depression) have equal importance to the other three “functioning” dimensions (i.e. mobility, self-care and usual activities). There are also clear differences with the other four value sets. Canada, although it also has the highest level decrements between levels 3 and 4 (49%), unusually has equal decrements for the remainder (17% x 3). For the other three countries, greater weight is attached to the three functioning dimensions relative to the two symptom dimensions. Although South Korea also has the greatest level decrements between level 3 and 4, it was greatest between level 4 and level 5 in Uruguay and levels 1 and 2 in Japan. Although the authors give a number of plausible reasons as to why these differences may occur, less justification is given in the choice of the four value sets they offer as a common currency, beyond the need to have a value set for countries that do not have one already. The most in-common value sets were the three Western European countries, so a Western European value set may have been more appropriate if the criterion was to have comparable values across countries. If the aim was really for a more international common currency, there are issues with the exclusion of non-Western countries’ value sets from their common currency version. Surely differences across cultures should be reflected in a common currency if they are apparent in different cultures and settings. A common currency should also have a better spread of regions geographically, with no country from Africa, the Middle East, Central and South Asia represented in this study, as well as no lower- and middle-income countries. Though this final criticism is out of the control of the authors based on current data availability.
Quantifying the relationship between capability and health in older people: can’t map, won’t map. Medical Decision Making [PubMed] Published 23rd October 2017
The EQ-5D is one of many ways quality of life can be measured within economic evaluations. A more recent way based on Amartya Sen’s capability approach has attempted to develop outcome measures that move beyond health-related aspects of quality of life captured by EQ-5D and similar measures used in the generation of QALYs. This study examines the relationship between the EQ-5D and the ICECAP-O capability measure in three different patient populations included in the Medical Crises in Older People programme in England. The authors propose a reasonable hypothesis that health could be considered a conversion factor for a person’s broader capability set, and so it is plausible to test how well the EQ-5D-3L dimension values and overall score can map onto the ICECAP-O overall score. Through numerous regressions performed, the strongest relationship between the two measures in this sample was an R-squared of 0.35. Interestingly, the dimensions on the EQ-5D that had a significant relationship with the ICECAP-O score were a mix of dimensions with a focus on functioning (i.e. self-care, usual activities) and symptoms (anxiety/depression), so overall capability on ICECAP-O appears to be related, at least to a small degree, to both health components of EQ-5D discussed in this round-up’s previous paper. The authors suggest it provides further evidence of the complementary data provided by EQ-5D and ICECAP-O, but the causal relationship, as the authors suggest, between both measures remains under-researched. Longitudinal data analysis would provide a more definitive answer to the question of how much interaction there is between these two measures and their dimensions as health and capability changes over time in response to different treatments and care provision.
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