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were on polytherapy, 41% on monotherapy, and 4% had no antihypertensive treatment. Polytherapy was more predominant with age, duration of diabetes, duration of hypertension, and comorbid complications. ConClusions: Although prescribing pattern of antihypertensive showed adherence to existing evidence-based guidelines, higher proportion of uncontrolled hypertensive patients was found.

Objectives: Since the introduction of non-vitamin-K-antagonist oral anticoagulants (OACs), an additional option for stroke prevention in patients with atrial fibrillation (AF) compared to vitamin-K-antagonists (VKAs) is available. The objective of this study was to assess patients' preferences regarding the attributes of these different treatment options. MethOds: We conducted a multicenter study among randomly selected physicians who were asked to recruit AF patients. Patients' preferences were assessed by computer-assisted telephone interviews. We used a Discrete-Choice-Experiment (DCE) with four treatment dependent attributes (need of bridging: yes/no, interactions with food/nutrition: yes/no, need of INR controls/ dose adjustment: yes/no, frequency of intake: once/twice daily) and one comparator attribute (distance to practitioner: < 1km/> 15km). Preferences measured in the interviews were analyzed descriptively and based on a conditional logistic regression model. Results: A total of 140 AF patients (age: 74.0±8.5 years; 57.0% male; mean CHA 2 DS 2 -VASc: 6.1±1.1; current medication: 27.1% rivaroxaban, 71.4% VKA, 1.4% other) could be interviewed. Regardless of type of medication, patients significantly preferred the attributes' level (in order of patients' importance) "once daily" for "frequency of intake" (binary-coded: once = 1 vs. twice = 0; Coefficient = 0.954; p< 0.001), "no" for "interaction with food/nutrition" (yes vs. no; -0.842; p< 0.001), "no" for "bridging necessary" (yes vs. no; -0.656; p< 0.001) and "≤ 1 km" for "distance to practitioner" (≤ 1 km vs. > 15 km; 0.644; p< 0.001). However, for the attribute "need of INR controls/dose adjustment" (yes vs. no; 0.020; p= 0.808) no significant preference in favour of one of the options are shown. cOnclusiOns: In our analyses, "once daily frequency of intake" was the most important attribute for patients' choice followed by "no interactions with food/nutrition" and "no bridging necessary". Thus, patients with AF seem to prefer treatment options which are easier to administer.

Objectives: We aimed to (1) describe the real-world treatment of UTIs in a T2DM population, (2) investigate UTI related healthcare resource use, (3) assess treatment costs associated with UTI, and (4) identify factors which may predict UTIrelated treatment costs. MethOds: We analysed an anonymized dataset from a regional German healthcare fund (AOK PLUS) including all continuously insured T2DM-prevalent patients from 2010-2012. Health care resource use was reported per UTI episode. A UTI episode was identified through coded outpatient/inpatient UTI diagnoses (ICD-10 N39.0) and, in case of recurrent diagnoses, prescribed antibiotics for UTI treatment. Results: A total of 456,586 T2DM patients (mean age of 73.8 years, 56.3% female, mean CCI of 7.3, mean observational period of 665.5 days) was included. We identified 48,337 UTI episodes. During an observed UTI episode, patients visited with a median/mean of 1.0/0.8 times a GP and 0.0/0.3 times an urologist. In 6.7% of the cases, an inpatient treatment was caused by a UTI with a median/mean length of stay of 7.0/8.7 days. In 74.8% of the observed UTI episodes, antibiotics labelled for this disease were prescribed (mean prescribed DDD 10.5 days). Mean/median costs directly associated with UTI treatment (bottom-up costs) were 315.90€ /102.28€ per UTI episode. Factors significantly increasing UTI-related direct bottom costs were age, female gender, worse CKD status (5/5), CCI, and at least one previous UTI infection in the reference period. In an additional top-down cost analysis, annual all-cause cost per patient year were 5,519 € higher in the UTI group compared to T2DM patients not having experienced an UTI. This translated into a UTI-related marginal cost-increasing effect of 3,916€ per patient year in a multivariable Gamma regression analysis. cOnclusiOns: Given that worldwide increasing prevalence of T2DM, the incidence of UTI infection in T2DM represents substantial resource use/cost burden for healthcare systems.