Frontiers in Pharmacology (Jun 2024)
Cost-effectiveness of durvalumab plus tremelimumab in combination with chemotherapy for the treatment of metastatic non-small-cell lung cancer from the US healthcare sector’s and societal perspectives
Abstract
PurposeMetastatic non-small cell lung cancer (mNSCLC) has a high incidence rate, and economic burdens to patients, healthcare systems, and societies. Durvalumab plus tremelimumab and chemotherapy (T+D+CT) is a novel therapeutic strategy for mNSCLC, which demonstrated promising efficacy in a phase-3 randomized clinical trial, but its economic value remains unclear.MethodsThis economic evaluation used a hypothetical cohort of patients with mNSCLC, with characteristics mirroring those of the participants in the POSEIDON trial. Several partitioned survival models were constructed to estimate 15-year costs and health outcomes associated with the T+D+CT, durvalumab plus chemotherapy (D+CT) and chemotherapy alone (CT) strategies, discounting costs and effectiveness at 3% annually. Costs were in 2023 US dollars. Data were derived from the POSEIDON trial and published literature. Deterministic and probabilistic sensitivity analyses were performed to assess the uncertainty of input parameters and study generalizability. The analysis was designed and conducted from September 2022 to March 2023. To evaluate the cost-effectiveness of T+D+CT, compared with CT and D+CT, for mNSCLC from the perspectives of the US healthcare sector and society.FindingsFrom the healthcare sector’s perspective, the T+D+CT yielded an additional 0.09 QALYs at an increased cost of $7,108 compared with CT, which resulted in an ICER of $82,501/QALY. The T+D+CT strategy yielded an additional 0.02 QALYs at an increased cost of $27,779 compared with the D+CT, which resulted in an ICER of $1,243,868/QALY. The economic results of T+D+CT vs. CT were most sensitive to the annual discount rate, subsequent immunotherapy cost, tremelimumab cost, palliative care and death cost, pemetrexed cost, and durvalumab cost. The T+D+CT strategy was considered cost-effective relative to CT in 59%–82% of model iterations against willingness-to-pay. thresholds of $100,000/QALY gained to $150,000/QALY gained. From the societal perspective, the T+D+CT can be considered as cost-effective as compared with CT or D+CT, independent of histology.ImplicationsIn this cost-effectiveness analysis, the T+D+CT strategy represented good value compared with CT for patients with mNSCLC from the perspectives of the healthcare sector and the society. This treatment strategy may be prioritized for mNSCLC patients at high risks of disease progression.
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