Abstract
Background
Drug use-associated infective endocarditis (DUA-IE) is typically treated with 4-6 weeks of in hospital intravenous antibiotics (IVA). Outpatient parenteral antimicrobial therapy (OPAT) and partial oral antibiotics (PO) may be as effective as IVA, though long-term outcomes and costs remain unknown. We evaluated the clinical outcomes and cost-effectiveness of four antibiotic treatment strategies for DUA-IE.
Methods
We used a validated microsimulation model to compare: 1) 4-6 weeks of inpatient IVA along with opioid detoxification, status quo (SQ); 2) 4-6 weeks of inpatient IVA along with inpatient addiction care services (ACS) which offers medications for opioid use disorder (SQ with ACS); 3) 3 weeks of inpatient IVA with ACS followed by OPAT (OPAT); and 4) 3 weeks of IVA with ACS followed by PO antibiotics (PO). We derived model inputs from clinical trials and observational cohorts. All patients were eligible for either in-home or post-acute care OPAT. Outcomes included life years (LYs), discounted costs, incremental cost-effectiveness ratios (ICERs), proportion of DUA-IE cured, and mortality attributable to DUA-IE. Costs (&US) were annually discounted at 3%. We performed probabilistic sensitivity analyses (PSA) to address uncertainty.
Results
The SQ scenario resulted in 18.64 LY at a cost of &416,800/person with 77.4% hospitalized DUA-IE patients cured and 5% of deaths in the population were attributable to DUA-IE. Life expectancy was extended by each strategy: 0.017y in SQ with ACS, 0.011 in OPAT, and 0.024 in PO. The PO strategy provided the highest cure rate (80.2%), compared to 77.9% in SQ with ACS and 78.5% in OPAT and X in SQ. OPAT was the least expensive strategy at &412,300/person, Compared to OPAT, PO had an ICER of &141,500/LY. Both SQ strategies provided worse clinical outcomes for money invested than either OPAT or PO (dominated). All scenarios decreased deaths attributable to DUA-IE compared to SQ. Findings were robust in PSA.
Table 1
Selected cost and clinical outcomes comparing treatment strategies for drug-use associated infective endocarditis including the status quo, status quo with addiction care services, outpatient parenteral antimicrobial therapy, and partial oral antibiotics.
Conclusion
Treating DUA-IE with OPAT along with ACS increases the number of people completing treatment, decreases DUA-IE mortality, and is cost-saving compared to the status quo. The PO strategy also improves clinical outcomes, but may not be cost-effective at the willingness-to-pay threshold of &100,000.
Disclosures
Simeon D. Kimmel, MD, MA, Abt Associates for a Massachusetts Department of Public Health project to improve access to medications for opioid use disorder in nursing facilities (Consultant)