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Asthma causes various clinical symptoms, including unpredictable severe exacerbations, and even though most patients can achieve a reasonable disease control due to adequate treatment, some patients do not. This study seeks to describe healthcare resource utilization (HCRU) and treatment of asthma and severe asthma patients in Germany. A retrospective claims data analysis has been conducted on adult asthma patients and a subset of patients with severe asthma, identified during July 2017 – June 2018. A proxy was used to identify severe asthma patients based on therapy options recommended within the German treatment guideline for treating these patients. These include (i) biologics, (ii) medium/high-dose inhaled corticosteroids (ICS) in conjunction with LABA/montelukast and antibiotics/oral corticosteroids (OCS), and (iii) long-term OCS therapy. HCRU and treatment of patients were observed during a 1-year follow-up period (July 2018 – June 2019). The study included 388 932 adult asthma patients (prevalence: 7.90%), with 2.51%-12.88% affected by severe asthma (depending on the definition). 22.60% of all asthma patients experienced hospitalizations (severe asthma: 36.11%). Furthermore, 13.59% received OCS (severe asthma: 39.91%), but only 0.18% (severe asthma: 1.25%) received biologics. Only 23.95% (severe asthma: 41.17%) visited a pulmonologist. A considerable proportion of severe asthma patients receive long-term OCS therapy. However, less than 50% have seen a pulmonologist who would typically seek a change in treatment to avoid the long-term consequences of OCS. To optimize the treatment of severe asthma in Germany, better referral of these patients to specialists is needed and considering potential treatment alternatives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Quadrivalent influenza vaccines (QIVs) contain antigens derived from an additional influenza type B virus as compared with currently used trivalent influenza vaccines (TIVs). This should overcome a potential reduced vaccine protection due to mismatches between TIV and circulating B viruses. In this study, we systematically reviewed the available literature on health economic evaluations of switching from TIV to QIV. Areas covered: The databases of Medline and Embase were searched systematically to identify health economic evaluations of QIV versus TIV published before September 2016.A total of sixteen studies were included, thirteen cost-effectiveness analyses and three cost-comparisons. Expert commentary: Published evidence on the cost-effectiveness of QIV suggests that switching from TIV to QIV would be a valuable intervention from both the public health and economic viewpoint. However, more research seems mandatory. Our main recommendations for future research include: 1) more extensive use of dynamic models in order to estimate the full impact of QIV on influenza transmission including indirect effects, 2) improved availability of data on disease outcomes and costs related to influenza type B viruses, and 3) more research on immunogenicity of natural influenza infection and vaccination, with emphasis on cross-reactivity between different influenza B viruses and duration of protection. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]