The financial burden of treating patients presenting with acute and chronic cough

OBJECTIVE

Coughing is a common symptom and responsible for a large number of healthcare visits. This study aimed to characterize healthcare resource use and associated financial costs in people with acute or chronic cough.

METHODS

A retrospective cohort study using routine data from the UK National Health Service. Adults (≥18 years) were selected if they had a cough record between 1 March 2014 and 28 February 2015 and were classified by duration.

RESULTS

A cohort of 150,231 patients was identified, of whom 12,513 (8.3%) had chronic cough, 38,599 (25.7%) had an acute cough with more than one cough event, and 99,119 (66.0%) had acute cough with one event in the study year. Resource use and combined costs of all healthcare contacts differed between cough groups. The healthcare cost per person-year in patients with a single record of acute cough was £739; for those with chronic cough, the cost was £3,663.

CONCLUSIONS

Patients with cough represented a substantial financial burden to the NHS. It was difficult to discern the specific portion of treatment associated with cough itself. However, people with chronic cough were associated with substantially increased healthcare use and costs than were those with acute cough.

Evaluation of the epidemiology of peanut allergy in the United Kingdom

Aims: To describe the epidemiology of peanut allergy (PA) in the UK over the last three decades.Methods: PA patients were identified from the Clinical Practice Research Datalink between 1987 and 2015. Incidence and prevalence of PA were compared between 2000 and 2015. Prevalence and relative risk (RR) of atopic comorbidities, anaphylaxis, adrenaline prescriptions versus matched controls were calculated.Results: Point prevalence of PA in the entire population and those <18 years increased from 31 to 202 and 116 to 635 per 100,000, respectively, between 2000 and 2015. Incidence increased from 8.6 to 18.2 per 100,000. Incidence in 2015 was 105 cases per 100,000 aged 0-4 years versus 13.4 per 100,000 aged 5+ years. Anaphylactic events affected 1.2% of the cases and 0.007% of the controls. The rate of adrenaline prescriptions was 5,910 per 100,000 person-years for PA patients. RRs for asthma, eczema and allergic rhinitis in PA patients versus controls were 4.5 (95% CI 4.2-4.8), 3.2 (3.1-3.4) and 2.6 (2.4-3.0), respectively.Conclusions: The prevalence and incidence of PA increased markedly over the study period. PA was associated with atopic conditions and anaphylaxis. PA patients had increased adrenaline prescriptions.

The Model of Mortality with Incident Cirrhosis (MoMIC) and the model of Long-term Outlook of Mortality in Cirrhosis (LOMiC)

The purpose of this study was to produce two statistical survival models in those with cirrhosis utilising only routine parameters, including non-liver-related clinical factors that influence survival. The first model identified and utilised factors impacting short-term survival to 90-days post incident diagnosis, and a further model characterised factors that impacted survival following this acute phase. Data were from the Clinical Practice Research Datalink linked with Hospital Episode Statistics. Incident cases in patients ≥18 years were identified between 1998 and 2014. Patients that had prior history of cancer or had received liver transplants prior were excluded. Model-1 used a logistic regression model to predict mortality. Model-2 used data from those patients who survived 90 days, and used an extension of the Cox regression model, adjusting for time-dependent covariables. At 90 days, 23% of patients had died. Overall median survival was 3.7 years. Model-1: numerous predictors, prior comorbidities and decompensating events were incorporated. All comorbidities contributed to increased odds of death, with renal disease having the largest adjusted odds ratio (OR = 3.35, 95%CI 2.97-3.77). Model-2: covariables included cumulative admissions for liver disease-related events and admissions for infections. Significant covariates were renal disease (adjusted hazard ratio (HR = 2.89, 2.47-3.38)), elevated bilirubin levels (aHR = 1.38, 1.26-1.51) and low sodium levels (aHR = 2.26, 1.84-2.78). An internal validation demonstrated reliability of both models. In conclusion: two survival models that included parameters commonly recorded in routine clinical practice were generated that reliably forecast the risk of death in patients with cirrhosis: in the acute, post diagnosis phase, and following this critical, 90 day phase. This has implications for practice and helps better forecast the risk of mortality from cirrhosis using routinely recorded parameters without inputs from specialists.

Evaluation of the healthcare resource use and the related financial costs of managing peanut allergy in the United Kingdom

Aims: We aimed to estimate the resource use and associated costs for patients with peanut allergy (PA) compared to matched controls. Methods: This was a retrospective cohort study using data from the UK Clinical Practice Research Datalink and Hospital Episode Statistics. PA patients were matched to two control cohorts: the first (simple-matched) were matched 1:1 on year of birth, general practice, gender and registration year. The second (atopy-matched) were matched on the same characteristics plus presence/absence of an atopic condition. Prescriptions and primary and secondary care contacts were compared between cases and controls. Results: 15,483 peanut-allergic patients were identified: 13,609 (87.9%) were simple-matched and 9,320 (60.2%) atopy-matched. The total per person annual incremental health-care costs associated with PA were £253 (atopy-matched) and £333 (simple-matched). For those with PA and a prior anaphylaxis incremental costs were £662, for those prescribed an epinephrine autoinjector incremental costs were £392. Extrapolated to the U.K. population, total excess costs of PA were between £33 and 44 million in 2015. Conclusions: Patients with PA had increased health-care contacts and consequently increased associated costs compared to controls. Observation bias should be considered in interpretation, but this study suggests that PA presents significant burden to health-care systems.

Polycystic Ovary Syndrome Is Associated With Adverse Mental Health and Neurodevelopmental Outcomes

CONTEXT

Polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) is characterized by hyperandrogenism and subfertility, but the effects on mental health and child neurodevelopment are unclear.

OBJECTIVES

To determine if (1) there is an association between PCOS and psychiatric outcomes and (2) whether rates of autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) are higher in children of mothers with PCOS.

DESIGN

Data were extracted from the Clinical Practice Research Datalink. Patients with PCOS were matched to two control sets (1:1) by age, body mass index, and primary care practice. Control set 2 was additionally matched on prior mental health status. Primary outcomes were the incidence of depression, anxiety, and bipolar disorder. Secondary outcomes were the prevalence of ADHD or ASD in the children.

RESULTS

Eligible patients (16,986) were identified; 16,938 and 16,355 were matched to control sets 1 and 2, respectively. Compared with control set 1, baseline prevalence was 23.1% vs 19.3% for depression, 11.5% vs 9.3% for anxiety, and 3.2% vs 1.5% for bipolar disorder (P < 0.001). The hazard ratio for time to each endpoint was 1.26 (95% confidence interval 1.19 to 1.32), 1.20 (1.11 to 1.29), and 1.21 (1.03 to 1.42) for set 1 and 1.38 (1.30 to 1.45), 1.39 (1.29 to 1.51), and 1.44 (1.21 to 1.71) for set 2. The odds ratios for ASD and ADHD in children were 1.54 (1.12 to 2.11) and 1.64 (1.16 to 2.33) for set 1 and 1.76 (1.27 to 2.46) and 1.34 (0.96 to 1.89) for set 2.

CONCLUSIONS

PCOS is associated with psychiatric morbidity and increased risk of ADHD and ASD in their children. Screening for mental health disorders should be considered during assessment.

Healthcare resource utilization and related financial costs associated with glucose lowering with either exenatide or basal insulin: A retrospective cohort study

AIMS

Type 2 diabetes is a major health problem placing increasing demands on healthcare systems. Our objective was to estimate healthcare resource use and related financial costs following treatment with exenatide-based regimens prescribed as once-weekly (EQW) or twice-daily (EBID) formulations, compared with regimens based on basal insulin (BI).

MATERIALS AND METHODS

This retrospective cohort study used data from the UK Clinical Practice Research Datalink (CPRD) linked to Hospital Episode Statistics (HES). Patients with type 2 diabetes who received exenatide or BI between 2009 and 2014 as their first recorded exposure to injectable therapy were selected. Costs were attributed to primary care contacts, diabetes-related prescriptions and inpatient admissions using standard UK healthcare costing methods (2014 prices). Frequency and costs were compared between cohorts before and after matching by propensity score using Poisson regression.

RESULTS

Groups of 8723, 218 and 2180 patients receiving BI, EQW and EBID, respectively, were identified; 188 and 1486 patients receiving EQW and EBID, respectively, were matched 1:1 to patients receiving BI by propensity score. Among unmatched cohorts, total crude mean costs per patient-year were £2765 for EQW, £2549 for EBID and £4080 for BI. Compared with BI, the adjusted annual cost ratio (aACR) was 0.92 (95% CI, 0.91-0.92) for EQW and 0.82 (95% CI, 0.82-0.82) for EBID. Corresponding costs for the propensity-matched subgroups were £2646 vs £3283 (aACR, 0.80, 0.80-0.81) for EQW vs BI and £2532 vs £3070 (aACR, 0.84, 0.84-0.84) for EBID vs BI.

CONCLUSION

Overall, exenatide once-weekly and twice-daily-based regimens were associated with reduced healthcare resource use and costs compared with basal-insulin-based regimens.