Non-healthcare costs of hepatitis C: a systematic review

ABSTRACT

Introduction: There is an increasing interest in the indirect (or non-healthcare) costs of hepatitis C virus (HCV).

Areas covered: Systematic review of original studies on the non-healthcare costs of HCV published in English or Spanish between January 2000 and March 2017. 19 studies addressing non-healthcare cost of HCV were included in the analysis. All studies but one contain treatments with monotherapy or dual therapy prior to the recent introduction of innovative and highly effective direct acting antivirals (DAAs). Five studies estimate the incremental non-healthcare cost of HCV with a control group, which is regarded as high-quality methodology. The incremental annual non-healthcare costs of HCV in untreated patients compared with non-HCV patients are €4,209 in the US, and taking data from 5 European countries costs range from €280 in the UK to €659 in France.

Expert commentary: Available studies may be underestimating the true burden of non-healthcare costs for HCV as they are all partial studies, mainly including absenteeism and premature mortality estimates. Moreover, there is a need for studies addressing non-healthcare costs of HCV in settings where new treatments with DAAs have been implemented, as they are probably changing the current and future burden of the disease.

KEYWORDS:

• Absenteeism
• cost of illness
• hepatitis C
• indirect costs
• non-healthcare costs
• presenteeism
• systematic review

Acknowledgments

The authors thank Professor Juan Oliva Moreno and the HEOR team at IMS Health for their comments on a preliminary version of this text

Declaration of interest

The authors have no relevant affiliations or financial involvement with any organization or entity with a financial interest in or financial conflict with the subject matter or materials discussed in the manuscript. This includes employment, consultancies, honoraria, stock ownership or options, expert testimony, grants or patents received or pending, or royalties.

Additional information

Funding

This review was conducted as part of an unrestricted educational grant under a cooperation agreement between IMS Health and Pompeu Fabra University. The funding sponsor had no involvement in the study design, analysis and manuscript writing.