ABSTRACT
OBJECTIVE:To evaluate the economics of azithromycin vs. amocillin clavulante in the treatment of lower respirato-ry tract infections. METHODS:System evaluation was adopted to retrieve the randomized controlled trials(RCT)about azithromy-cin(test group)vs. amoxicillin clavulanate(control group)in the treatment of lower respiratory tract infections. Information was col-lected and Meta-analyses were performed. On this basis and short-term decision tree model,cost factors were added to conduct the pharmacoeconomics by the principle of PICO of Treeage Pro 2011 edition software. RESULTS:Totally 18 RCT were enrolled,in-volving 3 365 patients. Results of Meta-analysis showed that there were no significant differences in the effective rate [RR=0.93, 95%CI(0.55,1.55),P=0.77] and incidence of adverse reactions [RR=0.79,95%CI(0.62,1.0),P=0.05] between 2 groups. The av-erage treatment cost in test group and control group was respectively 790.4 yuan and 884.4 yuan,and cost-effectiveness ratio was respectively 216.0 and 245.7,and the incremental cost-effectiveness ratio(ICER)was -1 392.59. CONCLUSIONS:Azithromycin has similar efficacy and safety to amoxicillin clavulanate in the treatment of lower respiratory tract infection,however,azithromy-cin has better cost-effectiveness.