Clinical College of Nanjing Medical University Reports Findings in Cancer (Trends in accessibility of negotiated targeted anti-cancer medicines in Nanjing, China: An interrupted time series analysis): Cancer

2022 AUG 23 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Daily China News -- New research on Cancer is the subject of a report. According to news reporting from Nanjing, People’s Republic of China, by NewsRx journalists, research stated, “In order to establish a long-term strategy for bearing the costs of anti-cancer drugs, the state had organized five rounds of national-level pricing negotiations and introduced the National Health Insurance Coverage (NHIC) policy since 2016. In addition, the National Healthcare Security Administration (NHSA) introduced the volume-based purchasing (VBP) pilot program to Nanjing in September 2019.”

Funders for this research include National Natural Science Foundation of China, China Medical Board.

The news correspondents obtained a quote from the research from the Clinical College of Nanjing Medical University, “Taking non-small cell lung cancer as an example, the aim of the study was to verify whether national pricing negotiations, the NHIC policy and the VBP pilot program had a positive impact on the accessibility of three targeted anti-cancer drugs. Based on the hospital procurement data, interrupted time series (ITS) design was used to analyze the effect of the health policy on the accessibility and affordability of gefitinib, bevacizumab and recombinant human endostatin from January 2013 to December 2020 in Nanjing, China. The DDDs of the three drugs increased significantly after the policy implementation (< 0.001, < 0.001, = 0.008). The trend of DDDc showed a significant decrease (< 0.001, < 0.001, < 0.001). The mean availability of these drugs before the national pricing negotiation was <30% in the surveyed hospitals, and increased significantly to 60.33% after 2020 (< 0.001, = 0.001, < 0.001). The affordability of these drugs has also increased every year after the implementation of the insurance coverage policy. The financial burden is higher for the rural patients compared with the urban patients, although the gap is narrowing. The accessibility of targeted anti-cancer drugs has increased significantly after the implementation of centralized prices, the NHIC policy and the VBP pilot program, and has shown sustained long-term growth.”

According to the news reporters, the research concluded: “Multi-pronged supplementary measures and policy approaches by multiple stakeholders will facilitate equitable access to effective and affordable anti-cancer drugs.”

For more information on this research see: Trends in accessibility of negotiated targeted anti-cancer medicines in Nanjing, China: An interrupted time series analysis. Frontiers in Public Health, 2022;10:942638. Frontiers in Public Health can be contacted at: Frontiers Media Sa, Avenue Du Tribunal Federal 34, Lausanne, Ch-1015, Switzerland.

Our news journalists report that additional information may be obtained by contacting Huining Yi, Nanjing Drum Tower Hospital, Clinical College of Nanjing Medical University, Nanjing, People’s Republic of China. Additional authors for this research include Yanyan Liu, Kexin Fang, Yuwen Bao and Xin Li.

The direct object identifier (DOI) for that additional information is: https://doi.org/10.3389/fpubh.2022.942638. This DOI is a link to an online electronic document that is either free or for purchase, and can be your direct source for a journal article and its citation.

Publisher contact information for the journal Frontiers in Public Health is: Frontiers Media Sa, Avenue Du Tribunal Federal 34, Lausanne, Ch-1015, Switzerland.

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