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Introduction: Type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) progression often results in treatment intensification with injectable therapy to maintain glycemic control. Using pilot data from the Initiation of New Injectable Treatment Introduced after Anti-diabetic Therapy with Oral-only Regimens study, real-world treatment patterns among T2DM patients initiating injectable therapy with insulin glargine or liraglutide were assessed., Methods: This was a retrospective analysis of claims from the OptumInsight™ (OI; January 1, 2010 to July 30, 2010) and HealthCore(®) (HC; January 1, 2010 to June 1, 2010) health insurance databases. Baseline characteristics, health care resource utilization, and costs were compared between adults with T2DM initiating injectable therapy with insulin glargine pen versus liraglutide. Follow-up outcomes, including glycated hemoglobin A1c (A1C), hypoglycemia, health care utilization, and costs, were assessed., Results: At baseline, almost one in three liraglutide patients (OI, n = 363; HC, n = 521) had A1C <7.0%, while insulin glargine patients (OI, n = 498; HC, n = 1,188) had poorer health status, higher A1C (insulin glargine: 9.8% and 9.1% versus liraglutide: 7.9% and 7.7%, OI and HC, respectively, both P < 0.001), and were less likely to be obese (insulin glargine: 10.8% and 9.2% versus liraglutide: 17.4% and 18.8%, OI and HC, respectively, both P < 0.01). The percentage of patients experiencing a hypoglycemic event was numerically higher for insulin pen use for both cohorts (OI 4.4% versus 3.0%; HC 6.2% versus 2.3%). During follow-up, in the insulin glargine cohort, annualized diabetes-related costs remained unchanged ($8,344 versus $7,749 OI, and $7,094 versus $7,731 HC), despite a significant increase in pharmacy costs, due to non-significant decreases in medical costs, while the liraglutide cohort had a significant increase in annualized diabetes-related costs ($4,510 versus $7,731 OI, and $4,136 versus $7,111 HC; both P < 0.001) due to a non-significant increase in medical costs coupled with a significant increase in pharmacy costs., Conclusion: These descriptive data identified differences in demographic and baseline clinical characteristics among patients initiating injectable therapies. The different health care utilization and cost patterns warrant further cost-effectiveness analysis.

Background: Effective glycemic control can reduce the risk of serious micro- and macrovascular complications in type 2 diabetes. However, many patients fail to reach glycemic targets due partly to low efficacy and adverse effects of treatment such as hypoglycemia or weight gain., Objective: To evaluate the short-term cost-effectiveness of liraglutide versus sitagliptin, in terms of cost per patient reaching a glycated hemoglobin (HbA1c) target with no hypoglycemia and no weight gain after 52 weeks, based on a recently published trial. , Methods: Data were taken from a 52-week randomized, controlled trial (NCT00700817) in which adults with type 2 diabetes (mean age = 55 years, HbA1c = 8.4%, body mass index = 33 kg/m2) failing metformin monotherapy were randomly allocated to receive either liraglutide 1.2 mg, liraglutide 1.8 mg, or sitagliptin 100 mg daily, in addition to metformin. For the cost-effectiveness analysis, the proportion of patients achieving a clinically relevant composite endpoint, defined as HbA1c  less than  7.0%, with no reported hypoglycemia 
and no gain in body weight, was estimated using logistic regression. Trial data showed that 38.9% of patients on liraglutide 1.2 mg and 49.9% on liraglutide 1.8 mg achieved the composite endpoint, compared with 18.6% on sitagliptin at 52 weeks. Costs of antihyperglycemia medications were accounted for based on published wholesale acquisition costs in 2012 U.S. dollars. , Results: Overall pharmacy costs (needle costs included) were higher for patients on liraglutide than sitagliptin. The cost per patient achieving an HbA1c less than 7% was lowest for patients receiving liraglutide 1.2 mg ($7,993) and highest for patients receiving sitagliptin ($11,570). When expressed as the mean cost per patient reaching target HbA1c with no hypoglycemia or weight gain (cost of control), costs were notably lower on liraglutide than on sitagliptin. Annual mean costs of control were $10,335 on liraglutide 1.2 mg and $11,755 on liraglutide 1.8 mg versus $16,858 on sitagliptin., Conclusion: The mean cost per patient achieving control, defined as reaching HbA1c target with no hypoglycemia or weight gain, was lower with liraglutide than with sitagliptin based on data from a recently published 52-week clinical trial.

Objective: To evaluate the impact of Medicare Part D coverage gap (donut hole) on adherence to diabetes medications., Study Design: Retrospective cohort analysis based on pharmacy claims data., Methods: The sample included 12,881 Medicare Part D beneficiaries with diabetes who entered the coverage gap in 2008. Sample patients had 3 different levels of coverage in the donut hole: no coverage, generic drug coverage only, and both generic and brand-name drug coverage. Adherence was measured by the proportion of days covered. We used a difference-in-difference model to evaluate the effect of coverage gap on adherence., Results: In the donut hole, the average copayment for diabetes medications increased substantially for beneficiaries with no coverage and beneficiaries with generic drug coverage only, whereas the average copayment for beneficiaries with both generic and brand-name medication coverage declined slightly. Compared with beneficiaries with full coverage of both generic and brand-name drugs, beneficiaries with no coverage (odds ratio[OR] = 0.617, P <.0001, 95% confidence interval [CI] = 0.523, 0.728) and beneficiaries with generic drug coverage only (OR = 0.702, P <.0001, 95% CI = 0.604, 0.816) were significantly less likely to be adherent after entering the donut hole. The difference between having generic coverage and no coverage was not significant (P = .1586)., Conclusions: The coverage gap in the Medicare Part D program has a significant negative impact on medication adherence among beneficiaries with diabetes. Availability of brand-name drug coverage in the donut hole is critical to adherence to diabetes medications.