Evaluating the health and health economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on delayed cancer care in Belgium: A Markov model study protocol.

Autor: Khan Y; Department of Public Health and Primary Care, Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium.; Department of Epidemiology and Public Health, Sciensano, Brussels, Belgium.; Interface Demography, Department of Sociology, Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Brussels, Belgium., Verhaeghe N; Department of Public Health and Primary Care, Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium.; Research Institute for Work and Society, KU Leuven, Leuven, Belgium., De Pauw R; Department of Epidemiology and Public Health, Sciensano, Brussels, Belgium.; Department of Rehabilitation Sciences, Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium., Devleesschauwer B; Department of Epidemiology and Public Health, Sciensano, Brussels, Belgium.; Department of Translational Physiology, Infectiology and Public Health, Ghent University, Merelbeke, Belgium., Gadeyne S; Interface Demography, Department of Sociology, Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Brussels, Belgium., Gorasso V; Department of Public Health and Primary Care, Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium.; Department of Epidemiology and Public Health, Sciensano, Brussels, Belgium., Lievens Y; Radiation Oncology Department, Ghent University Hospital and Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium., Speybroek N; Research Institute of Health and Society, University of Louvain, Brussels, Belgium., Vandamme N; Research Department, Belgian Cancer Registry, Brussels, Belgium., Vandemaele M; Radiation Oncology Department, Ghent University Hospital and Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium., Van den Borre L; Department of Epidemiology and Public Health, Sciensano, Brussels, Belgium.; Interface Demography, Department of Sociology, Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Brussels, Belgium., Vandepitte S; Department of Public Health and Primary Care, Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium., Vanthomme K; Department of Public Health and Primary Care, Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium.; Interface Demography, Department of Sociology, Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Brussels, Belgium., Verdoodt F; Research Department, Belgian Cancer Registry, Brussels, Belgium., De Smedt D; Department of Public Health and Primary Care, Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium.
Jazyk: angličtina
Zdroj: PloS one [PLoS One] 2023 Oct 30; Vol. 18 (10), pp. e0288777. Date of Electronic Publication: 2023 Oct 30 (Print Publication: 2023).
DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0288777
Abstrakt: Introduction: Cancer causes a substantial burden to our society, both from a health and an economic perspective. To improve cancer patient outcomes and lower society expenses, early diagnosis and timely treatment are essential. The recent COVID-19 crisis has disrupted the care trajectory of cancer patients, which may affect their prognosis in a potentially negative way. The purpose of this paper is to present a flexible decision-analytic Markov model methodology allowing the evaluation of the impact of delayed cancer care caused by the COVID-19 pandemic in Belgium which can be used by researchers to respond to diverse research questions in a variety of disruptive events, contexts and settings.
Methods: A decision-analytic Markov model was developed for 4 selected cancer types (i.e. breast, colorectal, lung, and head and neck), comparing the estimated costs and quality-adjusted life year losses between the pre-COVID-19 situation and the COVID-19 pandemic in Belgium. Input parameters were derived from published studies (transition probabilities, utilities and indirect costs) and administrative databases (epidemiological data and direct medical costs). One-way and probabilistic sensitivity analyses are proposed to consider uncertainty in the input parameters and to assess the robustness of the model's results. Scenario analyses are suggested to evaluate methodological and structural assumptions.
Discussion: The results that such decision-analytic Markov model can provide are of interest to decision makers because they help them to effectively allocate resources to improve the health outcomes of cancer patients and to reduce the costs of care for both patients and healthcare systems. Our study provides insights into methodological aspects of conducting a health economic evaluation of cancer care and COVID-19 including insights on cancer type selection, the elaboration of a Markov model, data inputs and analysis.
Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.
(Copyright: © 2023 Khan et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.)
Databáze: MEDLINE
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