Does Biosimilar Bevacizumab Offer Affordable Treatment Options for Cancer Patients in the USA? A Budget Impact Analysis from US Commercial and Medicare Payer Perspectives

Abstract

Background Bevacizumab remains the most widely used and most thoroughly characterized angiogenesis inhibitor for a range of advanced cancers. Bevacizumab-bvzr (Zirabev ® ), a biosimilar of bevacizumab, was recently approved by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), which provides a less costly option. This study aimed to evaluate the financial impact of introducing bevacizumab-bvzr from US commercial and Medicare payer perspectives. Methods A Microsoft Excel-based budget impact model was developed over a 5-year time horizon. Target population was patients to be treated with bevacizumab for FDA-approved indications. Drug costs (2020 US$) were based on average sales price and wholesale acquisition cost, accounting for payer-specific reimbursement models and provider settings. Drug dosing and duration were based on prescribing information and pivotal trial publications. Results In a hypothetical 10-million-member health plan, 503 and 723 patients were estimated to be treated with bevacizumab in year 1 and year 5, respectively. Assuming an annual market shift of 1.7%,

Real‐world use of IBI305 , a bevacizumab biosimilar, in a tertiary caner‐specialized hospital in China

“…A biosimilar is highly similar to, and has no clinically meaningful differences in safety, purity, and potency (safety and effectiveness) from an existing approved reference product 4 . Due to the expiry of patent protection, biosimilars can reduce the price significantly, improve the accessibility of the biologics, and offer a considerable advantage to patients 5,6 . There are several bevacizumab biosimilars approved by FDA and NMPA (Table 1).…”

Is the Scope of Costs Considered in Budget Impact Analyses for Anticancer Drugs Rational? A Systematic Review and Comparative Study

“…Because the consumption of medical resources during subsequent treatment regimens are similar, this will not have a significant effect on the BIA. This is why we excluded BIAs for biosimilars from our systematic review (76)(77)(78).…”

Efficacy and safety of bevacizumab biosimilar compared with reference bevacizumab in locally advanced and advanced non-small cell lung cancer patients: A retrospective study

“…However, no clinical data has veri ed the e cacy and safety of this biosimilar in clinical application. Existing trials (Jin et al, 2021;Luo et al, 2022;Yang et al, 2021) have excluded patients receiving previous treatment, patients receiving combination with targeted therapy or immunotherapy, patients with brain metastases, patients with rare genetic mutations (such as EML4-ALK rearrangement), and patients with Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group (ECOG) scores greater than 2. The e cacy and safety of bevacizumab biosimilar have no concensus in these populations.…”