The purpose of this analysis of health economic studies in the field of oncology was to investigate among sponsored studies whether any relationship could be established between the type of sponsorship and (1) type of economic analysis, (2) health technology assessed, (3) sensitivity analysis performed, (4) publication status, and (5) qualitative conclusions about costs. The Health Economic Evaluations Database (HEED, version 1995(HEED, version -2000 was searched on the basis of oncological ICD-9 codes, sponsorship, and comparative studies. This search yielded a total of 150 eligible articles. Their evaluations were prepared independently by two investigators, on the basis of specific criteria. When evaluators disagreed, a third investigator provided a deciding evaluation. There was no statistically significant relationship between the type of sponsorship and sensitivity analysis performed (P ¼ 0.29) or publication status (P ¼ 0.08). However, we found a significant relationship between the types of sponsorship and of economic analysis (P ¼ 0.004), the health technology assessed (Po0.0001), and qualitative cost assessment (P ¼ 0.002). Studies with industrial sponsorship were 2.56 (99% lower confidence interval (CI) ¼ 1.28) times more likely to involve cost-minimisation analyses, were 0.04 (99% higher CI ¼ 0.39) times less likely to investigate diagnostic screening methods, and were 1.86 (99% lower CI ¼ 1.21) times more likely to reach positive qualitative conclusions about costs than studies supported by nonprofit organisations. In conclusion, our results suggest that there is a greater probability that industry-sponsored economic studies in the field of oncology tend to be costminimisation analyses, to investigate less likely diagnostic screening methods, and to draw positive qualitative conclusions about costs, as compared to studies supported by nonprofit organisations. There has long been discussion as to whether commercial sponsorship of clinical studies produces a conflict of interests (Davidson, 1986;Rochon et al, 1994;Krimsky and Rothenberg, 1998;Smith, 1998;Stelfox et al, 1998;Montaner et al, 2001;Morin et al, 2002). However, only two applied studies deal with this issue for health economic studies conducted in the field of oncology. Friedberg et al (1999) found that, in the case of new drugs developed for oncological use (including haematopoietic growth factors, antiemetics, taxanes), pharmaceutical sponsorship of economic analyses was associated with a low likelihood of reporting unfavourable results. Subsequently, however, the same authors moderated these conclusions about costs in a comparison of industry vs nonprofit-sponsored economic analyses of six novel drugs used in oncology (Knox et al, 2001). After reviewing all the available pharmacoeconomic reports, they established the differences in study reporting -but not in the types of journals in which the studies were published -between pharmaceutical companyand non-profit-sponsored studies. They concluded that these results, and in particular the...
The purpose of this analysis of health economic studies in the field of intensive and critical care was to investigate whether any relationship could be established between type of sponsorship and (1) type of economic analysis, (2) health technology assessed, (3) sensitivity analysis performed, (4) publication status, and (5) qualitative cost assessment. Using the terms critical care or intensive care, all health economics publications in the field of critical and intensive care were identified in the Health Economic Evaluations Database (HEED, Version 1995-2001) on the basis of sponsorship and comparative studies. This search yielded a total of 42 eligible articles. Their evaluations were prepared independently by 2 investigators on the basis of specific criteria. When evaluators disagreed, a third investigator provided a deciding evaluation. There was no statistically demonstrable relationship between types of sponsorship and sensitivity analysis performed, publication status, types of economic analysis, or qualitative cost assessment.
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