Is comparative effectiveness entering a new "show me" state?
Bloomberg reports that,
"For two years, Pfizer, Inc. was quietly giving free doses of its expensive cancer drug Sutent as part of a campaign to help persuade the U.K. to pay for it. Last month, Pfizer finally won. The agency that advises the U.K.’s National Health Service decided the medicine extended the lives of patients enough to justify its cost, as long as the first course of treatment was free. The campaign wasn’t publicized by Pfizer or the U.K. and was revealed in interviews with government and company officials. The campaign cost Pfizer about 2.5 million pounds ($3.5 million) and gained the world’s biggest drugmaker an advantage over competing products made by Roche Holding AG, Bayer AG and Wyeth."
“It’s a relatively new phenomenon, and I think we’ll see more of it,” said Chris Brinsmead, president of the Association of British Pharmaceutical Industry.
The creative pricing arrangements lower the overall expense for the National Health Service and improve the ratio of cost to benefit that the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence uses to determine if a medicine should be covered. In all, drugs cost the nation 11 billion pounds annually, about 10 percent of the total health-care bill.
Johnson & Johnson’s blood-cancer drug Velcade won coverage in 2007 after the New Brunswick, New Jersey-based company said it would pay back the government for people who didn’t benefit. Patients get the first four doses of the 762.38 pound drug, then are tested to see if they’ve responded to the treatment. Those who improved continue with the drug. Johnson & Johnson provides a rebate of about 3,000 pounds for those who didn’t respond.
According to Sir Michael Rawlins, Chairman of NICE, “We’re meeting them partway.”
The complete Bloomberg story can be found here.
It's a creative approach based on outcomes -- a giant step towards recognizing the importance of personalized medicine the folly of basing reimbursement decisions on large-scale general population studies.
Bloomberg reports that,
"For two years, Pfizer, Inc. was quietly giving free doses of its expensive cancer drug Sutent as part of a campaign to help persuade the U.K. to pay for it. Last month, Pfizer finally won. The agency that advises the U.K.’s National Health Service decided the medicine extended the lives of patients enough to justify its cost, as long as the first course of treatment was free. The campaign wasn’t publicized by Pfizer or the U.K. and was revealed in interviews with government and company officials. The campaign cost Pfizer about 2.5 million pounds ($3.5 million) and gained the world’s biggest drugmaker an advantage over competing products made by Roche Holding AG, Bayer AG and Wyeth."
“It’s a relatively new phenomenon, and I think we’ll see more of it,” said Chris Brinsmead, president of the Association of British Pharmaceutical Industry.
The creative pricing arrangements lower the overall expense for the National Health Service and improve the ratio of cost to benefit that the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence uses to determine if a medicine should be covered. In all, drugs cost the nation 11 billion pounds annually, about 10 percent of the total health-care bill.
Johnson & Johnson’s blood-cancer drug Velcade won coverage in 2007 after the New Brunswick, New Jersey-based company said it would pay back the government for people who didn’t benefit. Patients get the first four doses of the 762.38 pound drug, then are tested to see if they’ve responded to the treatment. Those who improved continue with the drug. Johnson & Johnson provides a rebate of about 3,000 pounds for those who didn’t respond.
According to Sir Michael Rawlins, Chairman of NICE, “We’re meeting them partway.”
The complete Bloomberg story can be found here.
It's a creative approach based on outcomes -- a giant step towards recognizing the importance of personalized medicine the folly of basing reimbursement decisions on large-scale general population studies.
