Source

Andrea Messori, Sabrina Trippoli, Laboratorio SIFO di Farmacoeconomia, Area Vasta Centro Toscana, 59100 Prato, Italy.

Abstract

The combination of either boceprevir or telaprevir with ribavirin and interferon (triple therapy) has been shown to be more effective than ribavirin+interferon (dual therapy) for the treatment of genotype 1 hepatitis C. Since the benefit of these treatments takes place after years, simulation models are needed to predict long-term outcomes. In simulation models, the choice of different values of yearly discount rates (e.g., 6%, 3.5%, 2%, 1.5% or 0%) influences the results, but no studies have specifically addressed this issue. We examined this point by determining the long-term benefits under different conditions on the basis of standard modelling and using quality-adjusted life years (QALYs) to quantify the benefits. In our base case scenario, we compared the long-term benefit between patients given a treatment with a 40% sustained virologic response (SVR) (dual therapy) and patients given a treatment with a 70% SVR (triple therapy), and we then examined how these specific yearly discount rates influenced the incremental benefit. The gain between a 70% SVR and a 40% SVR decreased from 0.45 QALYs with a 0% discount rate to 0.22 QALYs with a 6% discount rate (ratio between the two values = 2.04). Testing the other discounting assumptions confirmed that the discount rate has a marked impact on the magnitude of the model-estimated incremental benefit. In conclusion, the results of our analysis can be helpful to better interpret cost-effectiveness studies evaluating new treatment for hepatitis C.