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An assessment of the cost-utility of therapy for psoriasis

Authors Stefan C Weiss, Wingfield Rehmus, Alexa B Kimball

Published 15 September 2006 Volume 2006:2(3) Pages 325—328



Stefan C Weiss1, Wingfield Rehmus2, Alexa B Kimball3

 

1Department of Dermatology, Kaiser Permanente Medical Center, Stockton, CA, USA; 2Department of Dermatology, Stanford University, Palo Alto, CA, USA; 3Department of Dermatology, Harvard University, Boston, MA, USA

 

Objective: Recently a number of new therapies have been introduced to treat psoriasis, but concerns have been expressed about their high cost. The purpose of this study was to determine whether most psoriasis treatments lie within the accepted range of cost-utility.

Methodology: 32 patients with moderate to severe psoriasis were administered the Euro-Qol 5 Dimension (EQ-5D) survey to calculate their health state utility. Economic modeling was performed with a range of therapeutic costs applying the calculated utility score. Paired t-tests were used to calculate significance.

Results: At the conclusion of 2 weeks of therapy, the mean psoriasis area and severity index (PASI) improved 35% to 7.2 (p<0.001). The mean health state utility score on the EQ-5D improved 11.5% from 77.7 units before therapy to 86.7 units after therapy (p=0.007).

Conclusion: A therapy that achieves at least a PASI 35 would be considered cost-effective by conventional standards if it does not exceed $33 600 in cost.

 

Keywords: psoriasis, cost-utility analysis, health economics