https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4571-654X
Abstract
Background
The current flows of the SSN represent the set of interest whose interconnection alone justifies the current study. These flows can be interconnected with other sources, institutional or otherwise, in order to answer well-defined questions.
Objective
The objective of the study is to verify, through the analysis of administrative databases, any differences in the consumption of health resources between biological off-patent originator drugs and biosimilars in real clinical practice, with particular reference to the rheumatology area.
Methods
Through the use of assisted databases (BDA) of ATS Pavia we evaluated the differences in terms of consumption of health resources related to the different drugs under analysis. Annual and daily costs were calculated by total patient cost, stratified for different treatments, considering the sum of total costs for the prescriptions of drugs subject to the analysis. Another objective was to evaluate the adherence of the drugs of interest, by utilizing specific indicators (MPR).
Results
A total of 145 patients were analyzed. Among enrolled patients, 26.9% of users were treated with a biosimilar drug, while 73.1% with a biologic originator. Adherence is higher if it is considered the population treated with biosimilar drugs (82.1%). Total cost (including drug prescriptions, hospitalizations, outpatient services, tests for any cause) during the observation period of 1 year is 14,274.08. 87.7% of the total is attributable to drugs. Non-hospitalized patients are the least expensive, whether they were treated with biologics or biosimilars.
Conclusion
In our sample, biosimilar drugs tend to be underused: the treatment of a patient with a chronic autoimmune disease is a clinical process that involves many health professionals, and a criticality could also derive from the difficult communication between the various professional figures who get involved with the whole patient treatment.
Disclosure
Professor Serena Bugatti reports personal fees from AbbVie, Bristol Myers Squibb, Eli Lilly, and Galapagos; grants, personal fees from Pfizer, outside the submitted work. Professor Giorgio L Colombo reports grants from Pfizer, during the conduct of the study. The authors report no other conflicts of interest in this work.