Announcements

Social Return On Investment measures the social „value for money“ of an intervention. In our project, though, we are providing an overview of studies measuring the return on investment of 15 health-related interventions from the societal perspective. The studies have shown that all interventions are worth the investment. Thus, the savings are higher than the costs of the interventions. The highest returns can be expected in the areas of “crime” and “income”.

A secondary analysis of reimbursement data (DRG-data) from public hospitals was conducted in order to determine how the Aortic Valve Replacement was implemented 2009-2016, either percutaneously (TAVI) or surgically (SAVR), in the Austrian healthcare system. For the period 2009 and 2016, in total 4,338 TAVI and 16,439 surgical aortic valve replacements (SAVR) were carried out. During this period the data show a constant rise in TAVI and a slight fall in SAVR use.  The analysed data show a rate of 107 TAVI per million inhabitants in Austria. 

For several years, the high-cost Transcatheter Aortic Valve Implantation (TAVI) has been a less invasive alternative to surgery for patients. The aim of the present work was to evaluate the health-economic evaluations of TAVI for inoperable patients and operable patients with high or intermediate surgical risk within a systematic review. The results showed that, TAVI was cost-effective compared to Medical Management in inoperable patients, whereas TAVI compared to Standard Management in inoperable patients and to Surgical Aortic Valve Replacement in patients with high surgical risk resulted in controversial results. 

As part of the professionalization of patients organizations and the expansion of their activities (eg. awareness campaigns, advisory services for patients and their relatives, etc.) the need for financial resources is also increasing. This need is often covered by pharmaceutical and medical device manufacturers. This update analyzed the extent of financial support for patient organizations from pharmaceutical companies in Austria in 2016. 40 of 118 PHARMIG member companies have declared donations to patient organization for the year 2016. A total sum of € 1.435.059 in grants to patient initiatives were reported by the PHARMIG member companies. Most grants (72%) were given to initiatives in the field of Oncology & Hematology, Neurology, Lung, Hemophilia, and Rheumatology.

As part of the professionalization of patients organizations and the expansion of their activities (eg. awareness campaigns, advisory services for patients and their relatives, etc.) the need for financial resources is also increasing. This need is often covered by pharmaceutical and medical device manufacturers. This update analyzed the extent of financial support for patient organizations from pharmaceutical companies in Austria in 2015. 36 of 116 PHARMIG member companies have declared donations to patient organization for the year 2015. A total sum of € 1.724.683 in grants to patient initiatives were reported by the PHARMIG member companies. Most grants (68%) were given to initiatives in the field of Oncology & Hematology, Neurology, Lung, Hepatitis, and Rheumatology.

Altogether there was a significant increase in disclosure in comparison to 2014. Both the number of pharmaceutical companies that declared financial contributions and the total sum of contributions has risen by 50%.