Background In the latter of 20th century, a global growth in allergic diseases has been witnessed, accompanying with spring-out of therapeutic drugs. However, trials did not clarify the comparative effectiveness and pharmaceutical economics of these agents. Severe adverse drug effects have been reported increasingly in the last few years. These made it difficult for clinical practice and selection of national essential drugs. Objective To assess astemizole, loratadine, cetirizine and tefenadine for allergic rhinitis (AR) and urticaria in terms of effectiveness, heart-related drug adverse effects and pharmaceutical economics. Search strategy Cochrane Library, Medline, Embase and Chinese Biomedical Database will be searched. Additional database should be searched for safety and economic studies. Selection Criteria The publication languages are restrained to English and Chinese. 1) Effectiveness: high-quality randomized controlled trials (RCTs) and systematic Reviews (SRs)/ meta-analysis for AR and uritcaria are included, with comparisons restrained to among these four drugs; 2) Safety: a hierarchy of evidences of these four drugs for allergic diseases are included. 3) Economical evaluation: cost-effectiveness and cost-utility assessment of these four drugs for AR and urticaria should be included. Methods of review data extraction sheet and quality appraisal table are separately designed. QUOROM STATEMENT and Jadad Scale are applied, respectively, to SRs and RCTs. Two reviewers independently select the studies, appraise the quality and extract the data. Any disagreement is solved by discussion. Data analysis Fixed effect model is first applied. Sensitivity analysis is employed to study the heterogeneity between trials. Randomized effect model is alternatively used when compromised.
Objective To systematically review the efficacy, safety, cost-effectiveness, indications, contraindications, and ethical issues for surgical treatment of Alzheimer's disease (AD). Methods The CNKI, WanFang Data, VIP, PubMed, Web of Science, Embase and Cochrane Library databases were electronically searched to collect for relevant studies on surgical treatment of AD from inception to November 26, 2024. Two reviewers independently screened literature, extracted data, and assessed the risk of bias of the included studies. Meta-analysis was performed by using Stata 17 software. Results A total of 59 studies were included. The results revealed that surgical treatment for AD had higher safety (OR=0.44, 95%CI 0.17 to 0.72, P<0.05), and patients had better ADAS-cog scores (SMD=0.54, 95%CI 0.18 to 0.90, P<0.05), with statistically significant differences. The economic burden of surgical treatment for AD increased with the severity of the disease. Deep brain stimulation may offer high economic benefits in the treatment of mild AD. The surgical indications can be summarized as: short disease duration, mild to moderate severity, and insufficient response to pharmacological interventions. Regarding contraindications, analysis of the included literature identified four core aspects: physiological and pathological contraindications, medical comorbidities and surgical risk contraindications, cognitive and psychological factor contraindications, and other contraindications. Ethical issues can be categorized into: informed consent and autonomy, ethical review and approval of research, and assessment of risks and benefits. Conclusion Current evidence suggests that surgical treatment for AD has certain benefits, but the surgical approaches for treating AD are still in the exploratory stage. Limited by the number and quality of the included studies, the above conclusion still requires more high-quality research to be verified.
Objective This review compared clinical effectiveness, cardiac safety and economics of astemizole, loratadine, cetirizine and terfenadine to provide evidence for adjustment of Essential Drug List in China. Search strategy We searched Medline, Cochrane Library, Embase and Chinese Biomedical Database. Fourteen databases for drug safety and pharmaceutical economics were additionally searched. Selection Criteria Randomized controlled trials and systematic reviews, published in English and Chinese and comparing two or more of these four antihistamines for allergic rhinitis and urticaria were included for study of effectiveness. Non-randomized clinical trials were additionally included for economic evaluation. Cardiac safety studies of antihistamines for allergic diseases of any type were included. Quality Appraisal Jadad scale was primarily applied to randomized controlled trials. Allocation concealment and intention-to-treat analysis were also appraised. The QUOROM statement was applied to systematic reviews and meta-analysis. Data extraction and analyses For the study of effectiveness, composite data were primarily extracted and analyzed by fixed effect model. Sensitivity analysis was done to explore the heterogeneity. For the study of cardiac safety, cases of adverse drug reactions and death were summarized. Difference of occurrence rate in sex and age were analyzed if possible.Electrocardiography and clinical symptoms were summarized. Results No studies on economic evaluation were identified. 27 and 6 randomized controlled trials, including 3 227 participants, for allergic rhinitis and urticaria were identified. Cetirizine was superior to loratadine (n=709) in symptom score and onset of action, superior to terfenadine (n=645) in Quality of Life and superior to astemizole (n=498) in patient satisfaction and onset of action. 73 h-ADR cases were identified in astemizole, 27 cases in terfenadine, 1 case in loratadine and none in cetirizine. No deaths were identified. Combination of terfenadine plus grapefruit juice (n=l8), itraconazole (n=6), nefazodone (n=67), and loratadine administration concomitant with cemitidine (n=30) significantly prolonged QTc interval. Conclusions Cetirizine was superior to other three antihistamines in terms of clinical effectiveness and drug safety. Astemizole and terfenadine could cause significantly more cardiac-related adverse reactions than cetirizine and loratadine.
With the increasing demand for health technology decision making in hospitals, the activities of hospital-based health technology assessment are increasing globally. Several developed countries, such as France, Finland, Denmark, Italy, Canada, The United State and Australia have carried out hospital-based health technology assessment activities. In order to further promote the development of health technology assessment in China and establish evidence-based management and decision-making concept of hospitals, the National Center for Medical Service Administration has carried out theoretical and practical research on hospital technology assessment by fully drawing on foreign advanced experience. This paper introduces the background, object, method and content of the research, the achievements of the pilot project and the prospect of the future, so as to provide a reference for readers to understand the overall situation of the project and related work.
Objective We aimed to evaluate the comparative efficacy and cost-effectiveness of the ECMO versus mechanical ventilation through a rapid health technology assessment. Methods PubMed, EMbase, The Cochrane Library, CNKI, WanFang Data, and CBM databases were electronically searched to collect randomized controlled trials (RCTs), systematic reviews, meta-analyses, complete economic evaluations, and CRD database for HTA reports from inception to December 2020. Two reviewers independently screened literature, extracted data, and assessed the risk of bias of the included studies. Descriptive analysis and summary were then performed. Results A total of 21 references were involved, including 2 HTA reports, 5 RCTs, 11 systematic reviews or meta-analyses, and 3 economic evaluations. The quality of the literature evidence was heterogenous, and only 2 RCTs of high quality were included for meta-analysis. The results showed that the difference of 60-day mortality between ECMO and mechanical ventilation was statistically significant (RR=0.73, 95%CI 0.57 to 0.92, P=0.007). The majority of recent meta-analysis literature showed that short-term mortality of ECMO treatment was lower than that of mechanically ventilated patients. The cost-effective literature from different countries all showed that it was cost-effective in their respective health system, however, the quality of the literature varied. Conclusions Current evidence shows that ECMO has better safety, effectiveness and cost-effectiveness for ARDS compared with mechanical ventilation. However, it still required to be verified by high-quality studies with a long-term follow-up. Validate conclusions are needed through rigorous health technology assessments.
Objective To evaluate the efficacy, safety and economical values of nucleic acid/nueleotides for clinical nutritional support and immune treatment. Methods The following electronic databases were searched: Chinese Biomedicine database (CBM), MEDLINE, EMBASE and SCI. Data were extracted by two reviewers. Applied RevMan 4.1 for statistical analyse. Results Forty-six randomized controlled trials were identified, involving nucleic acids/nucleotides for clinical nutritional support, infant feed, immune treatment. Eighteen randomized trials comparing the use of immunonutrition which comprises nucleotides with standard enteral nutrition in surgical and critical ill patients. Combined analysis directed that immunonutrition therapy decrease infection events, length of hospitalization and the cost. Only one trial reported the effects of adding nucleotides to breast milk substitute, but there is no valuable results for clinical practice. Twenty-seven low quality trials compared the use of "immune RNA (iRNA)" with standard methods in hepatitis, carcinoma and burn patients, combined analysis directed that there are not valid evidences to confirm the value of iRNA. Conclusions Immunonutrition may decrease infection rates, length of hospitalisation and cost in surgery and critical ill patients, but we can not affirm the role of the nucleotides in irmnunonutrition. No evidences support the point of adding nucteotides in breast milk substitute. Also, we can not affirm the role of iRNA in clinical immune regulation treatment. There are no available evidences in nucleic acids for caducity prevention and improvement of aging people’s health. Consequently, we advice Chinese health officials to enhance the management for applying "nucleic acids nutrients".
With the development of health technology assessments, the public are increasingly aware of the importance of assessing timeliness for health decision-making, which emerges the requirement for early and timely assessment for emerging health technologies. Providing early and timely assessments prior to a technology accesses the market or prior to implementation can provide decision-makers with sufficient time to develop an application program for a new technology. This paper mainly summarizes the profiles of three emerging health technology horizon scanning systems in Canada, Australia, New Zealand and Sweden, and compares and analyzes their related contents, thus providing reference experience for the construction of emerging health technology horizon scanning system in China.
ObjectivesTo explore classification management method of evidence-based evidence for medical consumables based on cost multiplication and to conduct empirical test.MethodsFour quadrants was used to explore the classification management of consumables evidence.Results95.22% of the “recommended” items in the consumables department were “recommended” by the group. 100% of group “recommended” items passed the committee resolution. Advice of consumables department and group was highly relevant with decision of commission.ConclusionsOne-dimensional recommendations allow the decision-making of group and committee to be more convenient. Cost calculation is based on all consumables required for medical treatment, which is similar to reality. The classification threshold requires further optimization, and the classification basis requires continual adjustment under different conditions of hospital. The evidence-based evidence evaluation method for medical consumables based on incremental cost ratio is a simple and rapid hospital health technology assessment method suitable for China’s national conditions.
ObjectiveTo present the application of mini-health technology assessment (Mini-HTA) method in configuration management of anti-magnetic anesthesia machine.MethodsFrom February to March 2019, the specialist operation assistant used Mini-HTA method to analyze and evaluate the anti-magnetic anesthesia machine applied by the department from basic situation and four dimensions, including technical dimension, patient dimension, hospital dimension, and economic dimension.ResultsA hospital health technology assessment report was prepared based on the evaluation of the specialist operation assistant, the suggestion of which was adopted by the hospital. As a result, an anti-magnetic anesthesia machine was arranged in the MRI room.ConclusionMini-HTA method can provide decision support for hospital equipment configuration and is conducive to the scientific and rational allocation of resources in hospitals.