Critical appraisal of cost-effectiveness studies of oncologic drugs recommended for incorporation by the Conitec in Brazil

Abstract

Objective: To perform a descriptive analysis and evaluate the methodological quality of the cost-effectiveness studies that based the “Comissão Nacional de Incorporação de Tecnologias no SUS” (Conitec) recommendations for cancer treatment. Methods: A survey on the Conitec website was performed in order to identify the recommendation reports for anticancer drugs, from January/2012 to June/2019. Reports for new drug incorporation that presented cost-effectiveness were included and analyzed. The methodological quality of these reports was assessed with the tool Consensus on Health Economic Criteria (CHEC). Results: Ten different indications of eight anticancer drugs were recommended by Conitec from 2012 to June/2019, but only five (50%) had health economic analysis. One study was excluded from quality assessment due to limited information access. Methodological quality varies among the studies. The worst domains assessed were related to appropriate measurement of outcome and costs, ethics-related discussions, conflict of interest, and generalizability of the results. A lack of standardization was observed in Conitec’s assessment on health economic studies submitted. Conclusion: There is a great heterogeneity in cost-effectiveness study quality of cancer drugs recommended by Conitec and relevant methodological limitations was noticed.