Articles

Inpatient resource use and costs associated with switching from oral antipsychotics to aripiprazole once-monthly for the treatment of schizophrenia

Michele Wilson, Benjamin Gutierrez, Steve J Offord, Christopher M Blanchette, Anna Eramo, Stephanie Earnshaw, Siddhesh A Kamat

Article Type

Original Research

Published

Schizophrenia is associated with high direct healthcare costs due to progression of disease and frequent occurrence of relapses. Aripiprazole once-monthly (AOM) has been shown to reduce total psychiatric hospitalizations among patients who switched from oral standard of care (SOC) therapy to AOM. In this paper the authors report the results of an economic model study to evaluate the psychiatric hospitalization-related medical costs and antipsychotic pharmacy costs during a 6-month period before and after initiation of AOM treatment.

Read more

Combination therapy in type 2 diabetes mellitus: adding empagliflozin to basal insulin

Andrew Ahmann

Article Type

Case Report

Published

Type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) management is complex, with few patients successfully achieving recommended glycemic targets with monotherapy, most progressing to combination therapy, and many eventually requiring insulin. Sodium glucose cotransporter 2 (SGLT2) inhibitors are an emerging class of antidiabetes agents with an insulin-independent mechanism of action, making them suitable for use in combination with any other class of antidiabetes agents, including insulin. In this review the evaluates a 78-week, randomized, double-blind, placebo controlled trial investigating the impact of empagliflozin, an SGLT2 inhibitor, as add-on to basal insulin in patients with inadequate glycemic control on basal insulin, with or without metformin and/or a sulfonylurea.

Read more

Metastatic squamous cell non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC): disrupting the drug treatment paradigm with immunotherapies

Sarah L Scarpace

Article Type

Review

Published

Lung cancer is the third most commonly diagnosed cancer and the leading cause of cancer-related death in the United States. This paper provides an overview of drug therapy options for squamous cell NSCLC with a focus on the evidence and clinical application of the anti-PD1 therapies. A comparison of the dosing, administration, indications, and differences in the measurement of PD-L1 expression in the clinical trials of nivolumab and pembrolizumab is also provided.

Read more

Antidepressant efficacy and side-effect burden: a quick guide for clinicians

Daniel Santarsieri, Thomas L Schwartz

Article Type

Review

Published

Prescribing of antidepressant treatment (ADT) for major depressive disorder (MDD) has increased substantially over the last two decades. In this paper, the authors discuss the evidence that supports the use of ADT based on FDA approvals, data from randomized controlled trials or meta-analyses and where these are not available, the authors discuss and apply theoretical pharmacodynamic principles to help guide treatment choice in MDD.

Read more

Register for alerts

I would like to be contacted by Drugs in Context when new articles are posted.