Cost-effectiveness of biologic compared with conventional synthetic disease-modifying anti-rheumatic drugs in patients with rheumatoid arthritis: a Register study.

Objective: The aim of this study was to explore the cost-effectiveness of biological DMARDs (bDMARDs) compared with conventional synthetic DMARDs (csDMARDs) for RA using real-world data from Finnish registers.

Methods: RA patients starting their first bDMARD and comparator patients using csDMARDs during 2007-11 were obtained from the National register of biologic treatments in Finland and the Jyväskylä Central Hospital patient records. Propensity score matching was applied to adjust for differences between bDMARD and csDMARD users.