Abstracts by keywords: patient preferences
Health preference research plays a crucial role in supporting patients and physicians in shared decision-making. Such studies reveal what is important to patients in their treatment, thereby enabling recommendations that better meet their needs – improving individualized care, promoting treatment adherence, and potentially reducing complications (Cramer 2004). The presented study investigated the value of treatments by assessing patient preferences. The aim was to gain scientifically sound insights into the preferences of people with type 2 diabetes. In particular, the study examined which aspects are important to patients when choosing medications for combination therapy.
05.10.2025
When discussing surrogates and endpoints, one quickly comes to the question of which treatment results and characteristics are actually relevant for the patient. The appropriate expression “patient-relevant endpoint” is anchored in the legal basis for early benefit assessment according to Section 35a SGB V.1 While in other places there is explicit talk of a “therapy-relevant higher benefit” or “therapy-relevant side effects” (cf. e.g. § 35 Para. 1b SGB V), is clearly aimed at the patient. In the associated dossier specifications for Section 35a SGB V, module 3.3.6 mentions patient preferences as a data source to be taken into account.2 Thus, the importance of patient-relevant endpoints and patient preferences has increased with the AMNOG (Law on the Reorganization of the Medicines Market), but what role they play in concrete terms plays is still to be clarified. Nevertheless, the IQWiG (Institute for Quality and Efficiency) commissioned pre-AMNOG for two pilot studies on preference measurement (Conjoint Analysis, Analytical Hierarchy Process), one of which has already been published. IQWiG also focuses on patient preferences in its current method paper (see IQWIG (2013); IQWIG (2010b); IQWIG (2011)).
24.01.2013
Most decision makers, including IQWiG, consider various patient-relevant endpoints to demonstrate the superiority of a therapy over a placebo or a comparator. The question arises: How can contradictory results in different endpoints be interpreted? The problem in benefit assessments with more than one endpoint is the weighting and the subsequent calculation of a key figure for the overall benefit. Without the aggregation of several endpoints into a score/index, the derivation of recommendations or regulatory decisions could be questionable.