New Real World Evidence (RWE) Study Confirms Cost Effectiveness of Iressa® (gefitinib) Under Single Payment Access (SPA) Scheme in UK

New Real World Evidence (RWE) Study Confirms Cost Effectiveness of Iressa® (gefitinib) Under Single Payment Access (SPA) Scheme in UK PR Newswire LONDON, November 8, 2012 LONDON, November 8, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- New RWE data presented today at the International Society for Pharmacoeconomics and Outcomes Research (ISPOR) annual conference in Berlin confirm that AstraZeneca's Iressa is a cost effective treatment for EGFR-TK positive non- [1]small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). The RWE data of 266 UK patients only, show that the average length of therapy with Iressa is at least 12 months for those patients who the NHS paid for, when supplied via the AstraZeneca SPA scheme. These data confirm benefit beyond the value accepted by NICE in 2010. NICE determined Iressa to be cost effective if used under the AstraZeneca SPA scheme on the basis that patients would receive 8.8 months duration of treatment on average. In the UK, Iressa is made available to the NHS via the AstraZeneca SPA scheme. The scheme works by invoicing the NHS only once per NHS patient, which covers the full duration of treatment regardless of how long that may be. The NHS is only invoiced for those patients who receive a third pack of Iressa - no charge is made if a registered patient only receives 2 packs (months) of treatment. The SPA scheme was introduced by AstraZeneca and was designed to ensure value for money to enable budget impact to be predicted more accurately and to be easy to implement across the NHS.