Aims: The study aimed to assess the budgetary impact (BI) of reimbursing varenicline in patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), type-2 diabetes mellitus (t2-DM) or cardiovascular diseases (CVD).
Methods: The BI was estimated comparing the current non-reimbursed scenario versus a projected reimbursed scenario using the Spanish National Health System (SNHS) perspective. A hybrid model was developed using epidemiological data and Markov chains to estimate smoking cessation rates with varenicline during a 5-year horizon. Costs of cessation were considered in the reimbursement scenario only. Efficacy, expressed as a 1-year continuous abstinence rate, was derived from clinical trials. Cost savings due to smoking cessation were extracted from local cost-of-illness studies. Results are shown as incremental cost savings. Univariate sensitivity analysis was also applied.
Results: A total of 68,684 patients stopped smoking in the reimbursed scenario compared with 15,208 without reimbursement. In the reimbursed scenario, total savings accounted for €36.3 million, showing 14.6 million accumulated additional savings compared with the scenario without reimbursement. Sensitivity analyses showed results to be robust with monetary savings starting in the third year of modeling.
Conclusion: Reimbursement of varenicline in smoking cessation is a cost-effective health policy in the SNHS in COPD, t2-DM or CVD, and could produce cost savings starting in the third year of implementation.
Download full-text PDF |
Source |
---|---|
http://dx.doi.org/10.1159/000449098 | DOI Listing |
J Nucl Med
January 2025
United Theranostics, Bethesda, Maryland.
Computational nuclear oncology for precision radiopharmaceutical therapy (RPT) is a new frontier for theranostic treatment personalization. A key strategy relies on the possibility to incorporate clinical, biomarker, image-based, and dosimetric information in theranostic digital twins (TDTs) of patients to move beyond a one-size-fits-all approach. The TDT framework enables treatment optimization by real-time monitoring of the real-world system, simulation of different treatment scenarios, and prediction of resulting treatment outcomes, as well as facilitating collaboration and knowledge sharing among health care professionals adopting a harmonized TDT.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAcupunct Med
January 2025
Osher Center for Integrative Health, Department of Family Medicine, School of Medicine, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, USA.
Background: Although growing numbers of patients seek acupuncture for pain management, few acupuncturists with insurance credentialing work in the conventional medical settings. This has resulted in increasing frustration among patients wishing to receive acupuncture in primary care settings as part of their insurance benefits.
Methods: A course of eight weekly sessions of group auricular acupuncture (AA) for chronic musculoskeletal pain was implemented in a US primary care clinic and billed to insurance.
Eur J Pharm Sci
January 2025
National Association of Pharmacies, Portugal. Electronic address:
Introduction: Amid the COVID-19 pandemic, various public health measures were adopted to reduce the transmission risk, including the full reimbursement of SARS-CoV-2 professional rapid antigen detection tests (Ag-RDT) conducted in clinical pathology laboratories, community pharmacies (CPs), and other authorized entities. This study aimed to assess the impact of integrating CPs into the Portuguese National Health Service (NHS) testing strategy on the capacity of professional Ag-RDT delivery, and to compare the equity in testing access with and without CPs participation.
Methods: This analytical cross-sectional study assessed the impact of adding CPs into the testing strategy based on two main outcomes by municipality: (i) average distance (in Kilometres) of the population to the nearest Ag-RDT site; and (ii) the average number of weekly hours available to testing per 1,000 inhabitants, as of January 31, 2022.
BMC Public Health
January 2025
Medical School of Nantong University, Nantong, 226001, Jiangsu, China.
Background: Ensuring equal access to affordable, high-quality, and satisfied healthcare for cancer patients is a challenge worldwide. Our study aimed to investigate preferences for public health insurance coverage of new anticancer drugs among non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients in China.
Methods: We identified six attributes of new anticancer drugs and adopted a Bayesian-efficient design to generate choice scenarios for a discrete choice experiment (DCE).
J Comp Eff Res
January 2025
Boston Scientific Corporation; 100 Boston Scientific Way, Marlborough, MA, USA.
This study assessed the economic impact of reducing one postoperative visit following inflatable penile prosthesis (IPP) implantation. Scenario analyses were used to model the effects of eliminating one 30-min IPP postoperative visit from the expected 2.5 visits accounted for by the American Medical Association resource-based relative value scale data.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFEnter search terms and have AI summaries delivered each week - change queries or unsubscribe any time!