Quality of Life, Value, and Price in Medicines to Treat Serious Disease

Abstract

There are many reasons for attempting to measure the quality of life impact of medicines on diseases such as cancer and AIDS. For the doctor it provides evidence of how well a patient is responding to treatment; for patients they become involved in their treatment and feel able to influence it. But what does it do for measuring the economics of that treatment? When quality of life measurements show that, because of treatment, there has been substantial improvement, it can provide reassurance for purchasers that money is being spent wisely. But should these data move beyond financial reassurance and towards resource allocation? For pharmaceuticals, this is important because resource allocation affects the price and the volume of drug used. I will examine 3 of the issues involved in the measurement of quality of life in the pharmaceutical treatment of serious disease. These are the accuracy and quality of our quality of life measures; the value of these measures in aiding resource allocation in well satisfied disease areas and in unsatisfied ones; and to raise a cautionary note about the use such measurement could be put to. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2016 APA, all rights reserved)