An update on the measurement of productivity losses due to rheumatoid diseases

Many health systems are interested in the impact of disease and interventions on non-health outcomes. Over the last 10 years, work productivity has become one of the most important topics. This study was conducted to review guidelines for economic evaluations worldwide to identify how views on the types of productivity costs to be included differ across jurisdictions and to review recent trials that have measured productivity losses to identify trends and compare consistency with guidelines from different jurisdictions. The guidelines from 28 countries were evaluated and only 12 required productivity costs to be included in the main analysis or the base case analysis. Little specific guidance was provided around the types of productivity costs to be included. Correspondingly, we identified only 10 trials that explicitly measured productivity outcomes and all were conducted after the year 2001. While there was a growth in the proportion of trials evaluating biologics to measure this outcome, it showed that fewer than 50% of even recent studies failed to measure or report productivity. Furthermore, most trials did not use a standard and validated questionnaire to measure all productivity loss components. In conclusion, whether the rationale for the exclusion of productivity impacts is that healthcare budgets should only be concerned with health impacts and ignore general social welfare impacts or whether productivity impacts should be ignored to maintain generational equity or whether the methodology of productivity measurement leads to imprecise estimates, the reality is that productivity impacts are real and to ignore them is tantamount to not being fully accountable to our citizenry.