Potential therapeutic and economic value of risk-stratified treatment as initial treatment of multiple myeloma in Europe.

Biomarkers associated with prognosis in multiple myeloma (MM) can be used to stratify patients into risk categories. An attractive alternative to uniform treatment (UT), risk-stratified treatment (RST) is proposed where high-risk patients receive bortezomib-based regimens while standard-risk patients receive alternative less costly regimens. An early Markov-type decision analytic model evaluated the potential therapeutic and economic value of different RST strategies compared with UT in MM patients in key European countries. Results suggest RST strategies were both cheaper and more effective than UT across all countries, with the molecular marker-only strategy RST-SKY92 producing maximum health gains (0.031-0.039 QALYs). The conclusions remained consistent in the univariate sensitivity analyses. These findings should encourage stakeholders to support the adoption of RST approaches in MM.