Parenteral and enteral nutrition and translational medicine T3: discussion on clinical study design for standardized application and patient benefit / 中华临床营养杂志

The ultimate goal of the development of parenteral and enteral nutrition is to achieve T3 transfer of translational medicine in this field. This study is an international cooperative, multicenter and observational clinical study conducted by CSPEN-NUSOC cooperative group for 15 years which is aimed to observe the effect of standardized nutritional support on clinical outcome and cost/ effect and verify the clinical value parenteral and enteral nutrition through investigating the prevalence of nutritional risk and malnutrition and the application of nutritional support in adult in-patients.

Parenteral and enteral nutrition and translational medicine T3: discussion on clinical study design for standardized application and patient benefit / 中华临床营养杂志

The ultimate goal of the development of parenteral and enteral nutrition is to achieve T3 transfer of translational medicine in this field. This study is an international cooperative, multicenter and observational clinical study conducted by CSPEN-NUSOC cooperative group for 15 years which is aimed to observe the effect of standardized nutritional support on clinical outcome and cost/effect and verify the clinical value parenteral and enteral nutrition through investigating the prevalence of nutritional risk and malnutrition and the application of nutritional support in adult in-patients.

Retrospective cost-utility and budget impact assessments of Hypericum perforatum in contrast with Fluoxetine treatment for depression in Karachi, Pakistan

In this study we have compared two different types of therapies i.e. herbal and allopathic system of therapies for Depression and studied them from the social perspectives. The Hypericum perforatum is compared with Fluoxetine [HCL] in terms of cost-utility and financial savings thereby evaluating its influence on annual expenditure of depressive patients that were randomly selected from 178 union councils of the city of Karachi, Pakistan. For both system of therapies a total of 356 patients were selected by stratified random sampling. Taking frequency of depression as '1' annually with discount rate at 3% for calculating the burden-of-illness in terms of disability-adjusted-life-years. The cost-utility and the budget-impact assessments were carried out to assess incremental-cost-effectiveness-ratio, and the budget-impact-per-onset as well as budget-impact-per-year values. In comparison with the Fluoxetine therapy, the Hypericum perforatum was found to relieve symptoms in 21.47% less cost; owing 29.23% less disability-adjusted-life-years and 21.45% less budget-impact-per-onset as well as budget-impact-per-year. The annual mean incremental-cost-effectiveness-ratio was found to be at 36.95±270.74 (less than GDP per capita threshold of Rs. 38,173.02). Hypericum perforatum provide the optimal utility with less impact on budget of a patient in comparison with the treatment of symptoms of depression with Fluoxetine.

Review of Programs for Improving Patient's Access to Medicines

OBJECTIVE: This study presented the analysis period, the complexity of combined therapy and comparator choice as the key limitations in the economic evaluation of new drugs, and discussed programs for coping with these limitations. METHODS: This study evaluated the post-evaluation, risk-sharing agreement, extra funding program, and flexible incremental cost-effectiveness ratio (ICER) threshold as actions or programs that would increase accessibility to costly new drugs. The study also presented the cases of other countries. The application of the post-evaluation was considered to deal with high uncertainty regarding new drugs. RESULTS: The risk-sharing agreement was introduced in European countries as well as South Korea and has been responsible for the shift from using the financial schemes to outcome-based schemes. The drug funding program has had troubled in securing stable extra funds. The application of higher ICER in the economic evaluation of expensive and innovative oncology drugs was criticized because of the inequity between oncology patients and patients with other diseases. CONCLUSION: Therefore, introducing and applying actions that would increase the accessibility to costly new drugs in South Korea have been deemed necessary after careful reviews and discussions with various stakeholders (insurer, policy makers, pharmaceutical companies and patients).

1．A Pilot Program of Implementing Health Technology Assessment to Decision Making in Japan / 薬剤疫学

Annual medical expenditure in Japan is continuously increasing. This may be caused by technology advancement as well as population ageing. Some new and high cost technologies, including new drugs, have been introduced. In order to balance technology advancement with medical expenditure, economic evaluation of new technologies is one way to approach the issue. In 2016 a pilot program stared at the Central Social Insurance Medical Council to evaluate cost effectiveness of some drugs and medical devices. In the pilot program, companies of selected products were asked to submit primary data and analyses to the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare. The ministry, together with some experts, reviewed the submitted data and re-analyzed if necessary. After these assessment process, not only cost effectiveness of each product, but also ethical or social aspects are considered in the appraisal phase. Finally results will be used to adjust reimbursement prices in the 2018 price revision. In the council, some issues toward full implementation of the new system will be discussed by 2019.

Cost-Effectiveness of Drug-Eluting vs. Bare-Metal Stents in Patients with Coronary Artery Disease from the Korean National Health Insurance Database

PURPOSE: The aim of this study was to evaluate the cost-effectiveness of the use of drug-eluting stents (DESs), as compared with bare-metal stents (BMSs) in Korea. MATERIALS AND METHODS: A retrospective cohort study was conducted between January 2000 and December 2007. Subjects were stent-treated for the first time between 2004 and 2005, with four years of follow-up (2004-2007) (n=43674). The incremental cost-effectiveness ratio (ICER) was used to calculate the costs of DESs compared with BMSs among patients with coronary artery disease (CAD). Cost-effectiveness was assessed with effectiveness defined as a reduction in major adverse cardiac events after six months and after one, two, three, and four years. RESULTS: The total costs of a DESs were 674108 Korean won (KRW) higher than that of a BMSs at the end of the follow-up; 13635 thousand KRW per patient treated with DESs and 12960 thousand KRW per patient treated with BMSs. The ICER was 256315 per KRW/death avoided and 293090 per KRW/re-stenting avoided among the CAD patients at the end of the follow-up. CONCLUSION: The ICER for the high-risk patients was lower than that for the low-risk patients. The use of DESs is clinically more useful than the use of BMSs for CAD and myocardial infarction patients, especially for those considered to be high-risk patients in Korea.

Impact of nutrition support on clinical outcomes for the patients with gastrointestinal disease at nutritional risk by Nutrition Risk Screening 2002 tool and the preliminary finding of cost-effectiveness analysis: a prospective cohort study for 275 patien / 中华临床营养杂志

Objective To evaluate the impact of nutrition support on the clinical outcomes of gastrointestinal disease patients at nutritional risk and explore the the cost-effectiveness of various nutrition support options.Methods A prospective cohort study was designed.The patients who met the predetermined inclusion criteria were followed up during the hospital stay.Nutritional risk was determined using the Nutrition Risk Screening 2002 on admission.The information with respect to nutritional support,occurrence and treatment of complications,length of hospital stay,and discharge destination was monitored and recorded.The direct costs of nutritional support and the costs of diagnosing and treating complications were calculated after discharge.Infectious complication-free patient was used as the effectiveness indicator in the cost-effectiveness analysis.Results Patients who had received nutrition support had significantly lower infectious complications incidence (6.8％ vs.19.6％,x2 =9.0,P=0.003) and significantly higher total hospitalization costs (P =0.0001).The adjusted (by general linear model) cost of parenteral nutrition (PN) cohort,enteral nutrition (EN) cohort,PN combined EN cohort,and the cohort without nutritional support were 5635,1212,5220,and 1339 China Yuan,respectively.The incremental cost effectiveness ratios were 36 101,-794,and 33 748 China Yuan for PN,EN,and PN-EN combination groups,respectively.Conclusions For the patients at nutritional risk,nutritional support can remarkably reduce the incidence of infectious complications.The preliminary resuits of cost-effectiveness:due to lack of enough data required by health economic professional,it can not be cited directly.