Treating idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis with the addition of co-trimoxazole: an economic evaluation alongside a randomised controlled trial

The effect of additional antimicrobial therapy on the outcomes of patients with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis: a systematic review and meta-analysis

Background

The effect of additional antimicrobial agents on the clinical outcomes of patients with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) is unclear.

Methods

We performed comprehensive searches of randomized control trials (RCTs) that compared the clinical efficacy of additional antimicrobial agents to those of placebo or usual care in the treatment of IPF patients. The primary outcome was all-cause mortality, and the secondary outcomes were changes in forced vital capacity (FVC), diffusing capacity of the lung for carbon monoxide (DLCO), and the risk of adverse events (AEs).

Results

Four RCTs including a total of 1055 patients (528 receiving additional antibiotics and 527 receiving placebo or usual care) were included in this meta-analysis. Among the study group, 402 and 126 patients received co-trimoxazole and doxycycline, respectively. The all-cause mortality rates were 15.0% (79/528) and 14.0% (74/527) in the patients who did and did not receive additional antibiotics, respectively (odds ratio [OR] 1.07; 95% confidence interval [CI] 0.76 to 1.51; p = 0.71). No significant difference was observed in the changes in FVC (mean difference [MD], 0.01; 95% CI − 0.03 to 0.05; p = 0.56) and DLCO (MD, 0.05; 95% CI − 0.17 to 0.28; p = 0.65). Additional use of antimicrobial agents was also associated with an increased risk of AEs (OR 1.65; 95% CI 1.19 to 2.27; p = 0.002), especially gastrointestinal disorders (OR 1.54; 95% CI 1.10 to 2.15; p = 0.001).

Conclusions

In patients with IPF, adding antimicrobial therapy to usual care did not improve mortality or lung function decline but increased gastrointestinal toxicity.

Supplementary Information

The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12931-021-01839-0.

Can the Consideration of Societal Costs Change the Recommendation of Economic Evaluations in the Field of Rare Diseases? An Empirical Analysis

OBJECTIVES

To analyze whether the adoption of a societal perspective would alter the results and conclusions of economic evaluations for rare disease-related healthcare technologies.

METHODS

A search strategy involving all the active substances considered as orphan drugs by the European Medicines Agency plus a list of 76 rare diseases combined with economic-related terms was conducted on Medline and the Cost-Effectiveness Registry from the beginning of 2000 until November 2018. We included studies that considered quality-adjusted life years as an outcome, were published in a scientific journal, were written in English, included informal care costs or productivity losses, and separated the results according to the applied perspective.

RESULTS

We found 14 articles that fulfilled the inclusion criteria. Productivity losses were considered in 12 studies, the human capital approach being the method most frequently used. Exclusively, informal care was considered in 2 articles, being valued through the opportunity cost method. The 14 articles selected resulted in 26 economic evaluation estimations, from which incremental cost-utility ratio values changed from cost-effective to dominant in 3 estimates, but the consideration of societal costs only modified the authors' conclusion in 1 study.

CONCLUSIONS

The presence of societal costs in the economic evaluation of rare diseases did not affect the conclusions of the studies except in a single specific case. In those studies where the societal perspective was considered, we did not find significant changes in the economic evaluation results due to the higher costs of treatments and the low quality-adjusted life-years gained.

Effect of Co-trimoxazole (Trimethoprim-Sulfamethoxazole) vs Placebo on Death, Lung Transplant, or Hospital Admission in Patients With Moderate and Severe Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis: The EME-TIPAC Randomized Clinical Trial

IMPORTANCE

Idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) has a poor prognosis and limited treatment options. Patients with IPF have altered lung microbiota, with bacterial burden within the lungs associated with mortality; previous studies have suggested benefit with co-trimoxazole (trimethoprim-sulfamethoxazole).

OBJECTIVE

To determine the efficacy of co-trimoxazole in patients with moderate and severe IPF.

DESIGN, SETTING, AND PARTICIPANTS

Double-blind, placebo-controlled, parallel randomized trial of 342 patients with IPF, breathlessness (Medical Research Council dyspnea scale score >1), and impaired lung function (forced vital capacity ≤75% predicted) conducted in 39 UK specialist interstitial lung disease centers between April 2015 (first patient visit) and April 2019 (last patient follow-up).

INTERVENTIONS

Study participants were randomized to receive 960 mg of oral co-trimoxazole twice daily (n = 170) or matched placebo (n = 172) for between 12 and 42 months. All patients received 5 mg of folic acid orally once daily.

MAIN OUTCOMES AND MEASURES

The primary outcome was time to death (all causes), lung transplant, or first nonelective hospital admission. There were 15 secondary outcomes, including the individual components of the primary end point respiratory-related events, lung function (forced vital capacity and gas transfer), and patient-reported outcomes (Medical Research Council dyspnea scale, 5-level EuroQol 5-dimension questionnaire, cough severity, Leicester Cough Questionnaire, and King's Brief Interstitial Lung Disease questionnaire scores).

RESULTS

Among 342 individuals who were randomized (mean age, 71.3 years; 46 [13%] women), 283 (83%) completed the trial. The median (interquartile range) duration of follow-up was 1.02 (0.35-1.73) years. Events per person-year of follow-up among participants randomized to the co-trimoxazole and placebo groups were 0.45 (84/186) and 0.38 (80/209), respectively, with a hazard ratio of 1.2 ([95% CI, 0.9-1.6]; P = .32). There were no statistically significant differences in other event outcomes, lung function, or patient-reported outcomes. Patients in the co-trimoxazole group had 696 adverse events (nausea [n = 89], diarrhea [n = 52], vomiting [n = 28], and rash [n = 31]) and patients in the placebo group had 640 adverse events (nausea [n = 67], diarrhea [n = 84], vomiting [n = 20], and rash [n = 20]).

CONCLUSIONS AND RELEVANCE

Among patients with moderate or severe IPF, treatment with oral co-trimoxazole did not reduce a composite outcome of time to death, transplant, or nonelective hospitalization compared with placebo.

TRIAL REGISTRATION

ISRCTN Identifier: ISRCTN17464641.

Acute Exacerbation of Interstitial Lung Disease in Adult Patients With Idiopathic Inflammatory Myopathies: A Retrospective Case-Control Study

Objective: This study aimed at clarifying the prevalence, risk factors, outcome, and outcome-related factors of acute exacerbation of interstitial lung disease (AE-ILD) in patients with idiopathic inflammatory myopathy (IIM).

Methods: Data of IIM patients who were admitted to the First Affiliated Hospital of Zhejiang University (FAHZJU) from September 2007 to September 2019 were retrospectively collected. And the IIM patients with AE-ILD formed the case group. In addition, age and sex matched IIM patients without AE-ILD were randomly selected to constitute the control group. A 1:2 case-control study and intragroup analysis were performed to identify risk factors for development of AE-ILD in IIM patients and unfavorable short-term outcome in AE-ILD patients through comparison, univariate and multivariate logistic regression analysis.

Results: AE-ILD occurred in 64 out of 665 IIM patients (9.6%) with a short-term mortality rate of 39.1%. And the 64 IIM patients with AE-ILD formed the case group. Besides, 128 age and sex matched IIM patients without AE-ILD were randomly selected to constitute the control group. The retrospective case-control study revealed that elevated on-admission disease activity (P < 0.001), lower percent-predicted diffusing capacity of the lung for carbon monoxide (DLCO%, P = 0.013) and diagnosis of clinically amyopathic dermatomyositis (CADM, P = 0.007) were risk factors for development of AE-ILD in IIM patients. The following intragroup analysis indicated that elevated on-admission disease activity (P = 0.008) and bacterial infection (P = 0.003) were significantly correlated with the unfavorable short-term outcome of patients complicated with AE-ILD. In addition, combined use of steroid and disease modifying antirheumatic drugs (DMARDs, P = 0.006) was found to significantly reduce the short-term mortality in IIM patients with AE-ILD.

Conclusion: AE-ILD is a less frequent but fatal complication in IIM patients with elevated on-admission disease activity, lower DLCO% and diagnosis of CADM working as risk factors, indicating the potential roles of autoimmune abnormality and hypoxia in development of AE-ILD. Elevated on-admission disease activity and bacterial infection could predict unfavorable short-term outcome of IIM patients with AE-ILD. A therapeutic regimen of steroid and DMARDs was found to reduce short-term death in these patients.

The Burden of Illness of Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis: A Comprehensive Evidence Review

BACKGROUND

Idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) is a debilitating condition with significant morbidity and poor survival. Since 2010, there has been increased activity in the development of treatments that aim to delay progression of the disease.

OBJECTIVE

Our study involves a comprehensive review of the literature for evidence on health-related quality of life (HRQoL), healthcare resource use (HCRU) and costs, and an assessment of the burden of illness of the condition.

METHODS

We carried out a systematic literature review (SLR) to identify economic evaluations and HRQoL studies. We searched EMBASE, MEDLINE and MEDLINE In Process for relevant studies from database origins to April 2017. Alongside the presentation of the study characteristics and the available evidence, we carried out a qualitative comparison using reference population estimates for HRQoL and national health expenditure for costs.

RESULTS

Our search identified a total of 3241 records. After removing duplicates and not relevant articles, we analysed 124 publications referring to 88 studies published between 2000 and 2017. Sixty studies were HRQoL and 28 were studies on costs or HCRU. We observed an exponential growth of publications in the last 3-5 years, with the majority of the studies conducted in Europe and North America. Among the HRQoL studies, and despite regional differences, there was some agreement between estimates on the absolute and relative level of HRQoL for patients with IPF compared with the general population. Regarding costs, after adjustments for the cost years and currency, the suggested annual per capita cost of patients with IPF in North America was estimated around US$20,000, 2.5-3.5 times higher than the national healthcare expenditure. Additionally, studies that analysed patients with IPF alongside a matched control cohort suggested a significant increase in resource use and cost.

CONCLUSION

The reviewed evidence indicates that IPF has considerable impact on HRQoL, relative to the general population levels. Furthermore, in studies of cost and resource use, most estimates of the burden were consistent in suggesting an excess cost for patients with IPF compared with a control cohort or the national health expenditure. This confirms IPF as a growing threat for public health worldwide, with considerable impact to the patients and healthcare providers.

Idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis: pathogenesis and management

Background

Idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) is a chronic, progressive disease characterized by the aberrant accumulation of fibrotic tissue in the lungs parenchyma, associated with significant morbidity and poor prognosis. This review will present the substantial advances achieved in the understanding of IPF pathogenesis and in the therapeutic options that can be offered to patients, and will address the issues regarding diagnosis and management that are still open.

Main body

Over the last two decades much has been clarified about the pathogenic pathways underlying the development and progression of the lung scarring in IPF. Sustained alveolar epithelial micro-injury and activation has been recognised as the trigger of several biological events of disordered repair occurring in genetically susceptible ageing individuals. Despite multidisciplinary team discussion has demonstrated to increase diagnostic accuracy, patients can still remain unclassified when the current diagnostic criteria are strictly applied, requiring the identification of a Usual Interstitial Pattern either on high-resolution computed tomography scan or lung biopsy.

Outstanding achievements have been made in the management of these patients, as nintedanib and pirfenidone consistently proved to reduce the rate of progression of the fibrotic process. However, many uncertainties still lie in the correct use of these drugs, ranging from the initial choice of the drug, the appropriate timing for treatment and the benefit-risk ratio of a combined treatment regimen. Several novel compounds are being developed in the perspective of a more targeted therapeutic approach; in the meantime, the supportive care of these patients and their carers should be appropriately prioritized, and greater efforts should be made toward the prompt identification and management of relevant comorbidities.

Conclusions

Building on the advances in the understanding of IPF pathobiology, the further investigation of the role of gene variants, epigenetic alterations and other molecular biomarkers reflecting disease activity and behaviour will hopefully enable earlier and more confident diagnosis, improve disease phenotyping and support the development of novel agents for personalized treatment of IPF.

A Cost-Effectiveness Analysis of Nintedanib in Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis in the UK

BACKGROUND

International guidelines recommend nintedanib (OFEV^®) as an option for the treatment of idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF).

OBJECTIVE

The objective of this study was to assess the cost effectiveness of nintedanib versus pirfenidone, N-acetylcysteine and best supportive care (BSC) for the treatment of IPF from a UK payer's perspective.

METHODS

A Markov model was designed to capture the changes in the condition of adults with IPF. Efficacy outcomes included mortality, lung function decline and acute exacerbations. Treatment safety (serious adverse events) and tolerability (overall discontinuation) were also considered. The baseline risk of these events was derived from patient-level data from the placebo arms of nintedanib clinical trials (TOMORROW, INPULSIS-1, INPULSIS-2). A network meta-analysis (NMA) was conducted to estimate the relative effectiveness of the comparator treatments. Quality of life and healthcare resource use data from the clinical trials were also incorporated in the economic model.

RESULTS

Nintedanib showed statistically significant differences against placebo on acute exacerbation events avoided and lung function decline. In the cost-effectiveness analysis, the results were split between two treatments with relative low costs and modest effectiveness (BSC and N-acetylcysteine) and two that showed improved effectiveness (lung function) and higher costs (nintedanib and pirfenidone). All comparators were assumed to have similar projected survival and the difference in quality-adjusted life-years (QALYs) was driven by the acute exacerbations and lung function estimates. In the base-case deterministic pairwise comparison with pirfenidone, nintedanib was found to have fewer acute exacerbations and resulted in less costs and more QALYs gained.

CONCLUSIONS

Compared with BSC (placebo), nintedanib and pirfenidone were the only treatments to show statistical significance in the efficacy parameters. We found substantial uncertainty in the overall cost-effectiveness results between nintedanib and pirfenidone. N-Acetylcysteine was largely similar to BSC but with a worse survival profile. INPULSIS-1 and INPULSIS-2 ClinicalTrials.gov numbers, NCT01335464 and NCT01335477.

Identification of Key Cost Generating Events for Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis: A Systematic Review

BACKGROUND

Idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) is an incurable, debilitating disease which impairs lung function and eventually leads to death. Currently, there is a lack of effective modifying therapies and treatments for IPF as the underlying epidemiological mechanism is not clearly understood. This leads to difficulty in diagnosing and managing IPF, which results in a high incurment of disease-associated cost. Even though IPF poses a substantial economic burden, there is a lack of research available on cost triggers and healthcare utilization, which can be a barrier to future economic evaluations of new medicines for IPF.

OBJECTIVES

We aimed to conduct a systematic literature review (SLR) to identify the key cost-generating events of IPF and to gather any related costing information.

RESULTS

The data showed that the main events triggering high resource use in patients were the symptoms of IPF progression along with comorbidities and lung transplantations. These events result in a high economic impact through the use of medications, health care professionals, and hospital stays.

CONCLUSION

More research is needed to identify the direct, and indirect, relationships between IPF events and the costs they generate. This would help to further evaluate the area of need for future health technologies and to understand what events should be targeted to reduce the global economic burden of IPF.

Pharmacological management of IPF

Idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) is a deadly disease with a median survival of approximately three years in historical cohorts. Despite increased knowledge of disease pathophysiology and selection of more targeted therapy, main clinical trials yielded negative results. However, two agents, pirfenidone and nintedanib, were recently shown to be effective in IPF and received marketing authorization worldwide. Both drugs significantly reduce functional decline and disease progression with an acceptable safety profile. Yet, none of these drugs actually improves or even stabilizes the disease or the symptoms perceived by the patient. Several other treatments and combinations are currently tested, and many more are ready for clinical trials. Their completion is critical for achieving the ultimate goal of curing patients with IPF.

Granulocyte colony-stimulating factor in secondary prophylaxis for advanced-stage Hodgkin lymphoma treated with ABVD chemotherapy: a cost-effectiveness analysis

Granulocyte colony-stimulating factor (G-CSF) is commonly administered to patients with Hodgkin lymphoma (HL) with neutropenia. We constructed a decision-analytic model to compare the cost-effectiveness of secondary prophylaxis with G-CSF to a strategy of 'no G-CSF' in response to severe neutropenia for adults with advanced-stage HL treated with ABVD. A Canadian public health payer's perspective was considered and costs were presented in 2013 Canadian dollars. The quality-adjusted life years (QALYs) attained with the G-CSF and 'no G-CSF' strategies were 1.403 and 1.416, respectively. Costs for the strategies with and without G-CSF were $38,971 and $33,982, respectively. In the base case analysis, the 'no G-CSF' strategy was associated with cost savings and improved QALYs; therefore, 'no G-CSF' was the dominant approach. For patients with severe neutropenia during ABVD chemotherapy for advanced-stage HL, a strategy without G-CSF support is associated with improved quality-adjusted outcomes, cost savings, and is the preferred approach.