Cost-effectiveness of bevacizumab therapy in the care of patients with hereditary hemorrhagic telangiectasia

Abstract

No US Food and Drug Administration- or European Medicines Agency-approved therapies exist for bleeding due to hereditary hemorrhagic telangiectasia (HHT), the second-most common inherited bleeding disorder worldwide. The current standard of care (SOC) includes iron and red cell supplementation, alongside the necessary hemostatic procedures, none of which target underlying disease pathogenesis. Recent evidence has demonstrated that bleeding pathophysiology is amenable to systemic antiangiogenic therapy with the anti-vascular endothelial growth factor bevacizumab. Despite its high cost, the addition of longitudinal bevacizumab to the current SOC may reduce overall health care resource use and improve patient quality of life. We conducted, to our knowledge, the first cost-effectiveness analysis of IV bevacizumab in patients with HHT with the moderate-to-severe phenotype, comparing bevacizumab added to SOC vs SOC alone. The primary outcome was the incremental net monetary benefit (iNMB) reported over a lifetime time horizon and across accepted willingness-to-pay thresholds, in US dollar per quality-adjusted life year (QALY). Bevacizumab therapy accrued 9.3 QALYs while generating $428 000 in costs, compared with 8.3 QALYs and $699 000 in costs accrued in the SOC strategy. The iNMB of bevacizumab therapy vs the SOC was $433 000. No parameter variation and no scenario analysis, including choice of iron supplementation product, changed the outcome of bevacizumab being a cost-saving strategy. Bevacizumab therapy also saved patients an average of 133 hours spent receiving HHT-specific care per year of life. In probabilistic sensitivity analysis, bevacizumab was favored in 100% of all 10 000 Monte Carlo iterations across base-case and all scenario analyses. Bevacizumab should be considered for more favorable formulary placement in the care of patients with moderate-to-severe HHT.