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Is telehealthcare for heart failure patients cost-effective? An economic evaluation alongside the Danish TeleCare North heart failure trial.

ABSTRACT: OBJECTIVE:This study aimed to assess the cost-effectiveness of telehealthcare in heart failure patients as add-on to usual care. DESIGN:A cost-utility analysis was conducted from a public payer perspective alongside the randomised controlled TeleCare North trial. SETTING:The North Denmark Region, Denmark. PARTICIPANTS:The study included 274 heart failure patients with self-reported New York Heart Association class II-IV. INTERVENTIONS:Patients in the intervention group were provided with a Telekit consisting of a tablet, a digital blood pressure monitor, and a scale and were instructed to perform measurements one to two times a week. The responsibility of the education, instructions and monitoring of the heart failure (HF) patients was placed on municipality nurses trained in HF and telemonitoring. Both groups received usual care. OUTCOME MEASURES:Cost-effectiveness was reported as incremental net monetary benefit (NMB). A micro-costing approach was applied to evaluate the derived savings in the first year in the public health sector. Quality-adjusted life-years (QALY) gained were estimated using the EuroQol 5-Dimensions 5-Levels questionnaire at baseline and at a 1-year follow-up. RESULTS:Data for 274 patients were included in the main analysis. The telehealthcare solution provided a positive incremental NMB of £5164. The 1-year adjusted QALY difference between the telehealthcare solution and the usual care group was 0.0034 (95% CI: -0.0711 to 0.0780). The adjusted difference in costs was -£5096 (95% CI: -8736 to -1456) corresponding to a reduction in total healthcare costs by 35%. All sensitivity analyses showed the main results were robust. CONCLUSIONS:The TeleCare North solution for monitoring HF was highly cost-effective. There were significant cost savings on hospitalisations, primary care contacts and total costs. TRIAL REGISTRATION NUMBER:ClinicalTrials.gov: NCT02860013.

SUBMITTER: Vestergaard AS

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7045102 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Is telehealthcare for heart failure patients cost-effective? An economic evaluation alongside the Danish TeleCare North heart failure trial.

Vestergaard Anne Sig AS Hansen Louise L Sørensen Sabrina Storgaard SS Jensen Morten Berg MB Ehlers Lars Holger LH Ehlers Lars Holger LH

BMJ open 20200127 1

<h4>Objective</h4>This study aimed to assess the cost-effectiveness of telehealthcare in heart failure patients as add-on to usual care.<h4>Design</h4>A cost-utility analysis was conducted from a public payer perspective alongside the randomised controlled TeleCare North trial.<h4>Setting</h4>The North Denmark Region, Denmark.<h4>Participants</h4>The study included 274 heart failure patients with self-reported New York Heart Association class II-IV.<h4>Interventions</h4>Patients in the intervent ...[more]

PMID: 31992604

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Project description:OBJECTIVES:To investigate the cost-effectiveness of a telehealthcare solution in addition to usual care compared with usual care. DESIGN:A 12-month cost-utility analysis conducted alongside a cluster-randomised trial. SETTING:Community-based setting in the geographical area of North Denmark Region in Denmark. PARTICIPANTS:26 municipality districts define randomisation clusters with 13 districts in each arm. 1225 patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease were enrolled, of which 578 patients were randomised to telehealthcare and 647 to usual care. INTERVENTIONS:In addition to usual care, patients in the intervention group received a set of telehealthcare equipment and were monitored by a municipality-based healthcare team. Patients in the control group received usual care. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURE:Incremental costs per quality-adjusted life-years gained from baseline up to 12 months follow-up. RESULTS:From a healthcare and social sector perspective, the adjusted mean difference in total costs between telehealthcare and usual care was €728 (95% CI -754 to 2211) and the adjusted mean difference in quality-adjusted life-years gained was 0.0132 (95% CI -0.0083 to 0.0346). The incremental cost-effectiveness ratio was €55 327 per quality-adjusted life-year gained. Decision-makers should be willing to pay more than €55 000 to achieve a probability of cost-effectiveness >50%. This conclusion is robust to changes in the definition of hospital contacts and reduced intervention costs. Only in the most optimistic scenario combining the effects of all sensitivity analyses, does the incremental cost-effectiveness ratio fall below the UK thresholds values (€21 068 per quality-adjusted life-year). CONCLUSIONS:Telehealthcare is unlikely to be a cost-effective addition to usual care, if it is offered to all patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and if the willingness-to-pay threshold values from the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence are applied. TRIAL REGISTRATION:Clinicaltrials.gov, NCT01984840, 14 November 2013.

Project description:PurposeResults from the Danish cluster-randomized trial of telehealthcare to 1,225 patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), the Danish Telecare North Trial, concluded that the telehealthcare solution was unlikely to be cost-effective, by applying international willingness-to-pay threshold values. The purpose of this article was to assess potential sources of variation across subgroups, which could explain overall cost-effectiveness results or be utilized in future economic studies in telehealthcare research.MethodsFirst, the cost-structures and cost-effectiveness across COPD severities were analyzed. Second, five additional subgroup analyses were conducted, focusing on differences in cost-effectiveness across a set of comorbidities, age-groups, genders, resource patterns (resource use in the social care sector prior to randomization), and delivery sites. All subgroups were investigated post hoc. In analyzing cost-effectiveness, two separate linear mixed-effects models with treatment-by-covariate interactions were applied: one for quality-adjusted life-year (QALY) gain and one for total healthcare and social sector costs. Probabilistic sensitivity analysis was used for each subgroup result in order to quantify the uncertainty around the cost-effectiveness results.ResultsThe study concludes that, across the COPD severities, patients with severe COPD (GOLD 3 classification) are likely to be the most cost-effective group. This is primarily due to lower hospital-admission and primary-care costs. Telehealthcare for patients younger than 60 years is also more likely to be cost-effective than for older COPD patients. Overall, results indicate that existing resource patterns of patients and variations in delivery-site practices might have a strong influence on cost-effectiveness, possibly stronger than the included health or sociodemographic sources of heterogeneity.ConclusionFuture research should focus more on sources of heterogeneity found in the implementation context and the way telehealthcare is adopted (eg, by integrating formative evaluation into cost-effectiveness analyses).Trial registrationClinicaltrials.gov, NCT01984840.

Project description:BACKGROUND:Several heart failure studies have shown promising results for implementing telehealthcare. These studies have led to clinical and political interest in telehealthcare as a way to improve heart failure outcomes and lower costs. However, there is a need for large-scale clinical trials with cost-effectiveness assessments. METHODS/DESIGN:The present study is known as the TeleCare North Heart Failure Trial in Denmark. We are studying the health effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of a telehealth (Telekit) solution compared with usual care for patients with heart failure. The design is a multicenter, two-arm, parallel-group, nonblinded, superiority randomized controlled trial. Outpatient healthcare centers will be responsible for recruiting eligible participants (600 participants are expected) for the trial in the geographic area of the North Denmark Region. Participants are qualified for inclusion if they have been diagnosed according to national guidelines and are categorized in New York Heart Association class 2, 3, or 4. Patients must have a permanent residence and be motivated to use telehealth care. The primary outcomes are changes in health-related quality of life (assessed using the Kansas City Cardiomyopathy Questionnaire, the EuroQol EQ-5D-5L questionnaire, and the Short Form Health Survey [SF-36]) and in the incremental cost-effectiveness ratio measured from baseline to follow-up. The secondary outcomes are changes in mortality and in physiological indicators such as blood pressure, pulse, and weight. DISCUSSION:The TeleCare North Heart Failure Trial is intended to improve the international evidence base for the health effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of telehealthcare for patients with heart failure. The expectation is that the results of the trial can be generalized to all municipalities in Denmark and serve as an inspiration for further international research. TRIAL REGISTRATION:ClinicalTrials.gov ( NCT02860013 ). Registered on 28 July 2016.

Project description:ObjectiveTo assess the cost utility of early psychosocial intervention for patients with Alzheimer's disease and their primary caregivers.DesignCost utility evaluation alongside a multicentre, randomised controlled trial with 3 years of follow-up.SettingPrimary care and memory clinics in five Danish districts.Participants330 community-dwelling patients and their primary caregivers.InterventionPsychosocial counselling and support lasting 8-12 months after diagnosis and follow-up at 3, 6, 12 and 36 months in the intervention group or follow-up only in the control group.Main outcome measuresThe primary outcome measure was the cost of additional quality-adjusted life years (QALYs). Costs were measured from a societal perspective, including the costs of healthcare, social care, informal care and production loss. QALYs were estimated separately for the patient and the caregiver before aggregation for the main analysis.ResultsNone of the observed cost and QALY measures were significantly different between the intervention and control groups, although a tendency was noted for psychosocial care leading to cost increases with informal care that was not outweighed by the tendency for cost savings with formal care. The probability of psychosocial intervention being cost-effective did not exceed 36% for any threshold value. The alternative scenario analysis showed that the probability of cost-effectiveness increased over the range of threshold values used if the cost perspective was restricted to formal healthcare.ConclusionsA multifaceted, psychosocial intervention programme was found unlikely to be cost-effective from a societal perspective. The recommendation for practice in settings that are similar to the Danish setting is to provide follow-up with referral to available local support programmes when needed, and to restrict large multifaceted intervention programmes to patients and caregivers with special needs until further evidence for cost-effectiveness emerges.Trial registrationThe study was registered in the Clinical Trial Database as ISRCTN74848736.

Dataset Information

Is telehealthcare for heart failure patients cost-effective? An economic evaluation alongside the Danish TeleCare North heart failure trial.

Publications

Is telehealthcare for heart failure patients cost-effective? An economic evaluation alongside the Danish TeleCare North heart failure trial.

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