Cost-utility analysis of antibiotic therapy versus appendicectomy for acute uncomplicated appendicitis
File(s)ijerph-18-08473-v2.pdf (1.9 MB)
Published version
Author(s)
Type
Journal Article
Abstract
Background: Current UK National Health Service (NHS) guidelines recommend appendicectomy as gold standard treatment for acute uncomplicated appendicitis. However, an alternative non-surgical management involves administrating antibiotic-only therapy with significantly lower costs. Therefore, a UK-based cost-utility analysis (CUA) was performed to compare ap-pendicectomy with an antibiotic-only treatment from an NHS perspective. Methods: This eco-nomic evaluation modelled health-outcome data using the ACTUAA (2021) prospective multi-centre trial. The non-randomised control trial followed 318 patients given either antibiotic therapy or appendicectomy, with quality of life (QOL) assessed using the SF-12 questionnaires adminis-tered 1-year post-treatment. A CUA was conducted over a 1-year time horizon, measuring benefits in quality adjusted life years (QALYs) and costs in pound sterling using a propensity score-matched approach to control for selection based on observable factors. Results: The CUA produced an in-cremental cost-effectiveness ratio (ICER) of −GBP 23,278.51 (−EUR 27,227.80) per QALY. Therefore, for each QALY gained using antibiotic-only treatment instead of appendicectomy, an extra GBP 23,278.51 was saved. Additionally, two sensitivity analyses were conducted to account for post-operative or post-treatment complications. The antibiotic-only option remained dominant in both scenarios. Conclusion: While the results do not rely on a randomized sample, the analysis based on a 1-year follow-up suggested that antibiotics were largely more cost-effective than ap-pendicectomy and led to improved QOL outcomes for patients. The ICER value of −GBP 23,278.51 demonstrates that the NHS must give further consideration to the current gold standard treatment in acute uncomplicated appendicitis.
Date Issued
2021-08-11
Date Acceptance
2021-08-06
Citation
International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 2021, 18 (16), pp.1-15
ISSN
1660-4601
Publisher
MDPI AG
Start Page
1
End Page
15
Journal / Book Title
International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health
Volume
18
Issue
16
Copyright Statement
© 2021 by the authors.
Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.
This article is an open access article
distributed under the terms and
conditions of the Creative Commons
Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.
This article is an open access article
distributed under the terms and
conditions of the Creative Commons
Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
License URL
Identifier
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/18/16/8473
Subjects
Toxicology
Publication Status
Published
Date Publish Online
2021-08-11