Dr. Davids on Cost Effectiveness of Time-Limited Therapy With Venetoclax/Obinutuzumab in CLL

Matthew S. Davids, MD, MMSc, associate director, Center for Lymphocytic Leukemia, physician, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, and assistant professor of medicine, Harvard Medical School, discusses the potential cost effectiveness of a 12-month fixed duration of venetoclax (Venclexta) in combination with obinutuzumab (Gazyva) in first-line chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL).

At the 2019 ASH Annual Meeting, Davids presented data on the cost of effectiveness of venetoclax/obinutuzumab compared with other frontline treatment regimens in CLL. Notably, many frontline regimens are comprised of novel agents, which are expensive. As such, it will be important to determine the relative cost effectiveness of these regimens, particularly as it relates to time-limited and continuous treatment strategies.

In the analysis, investigators compared the relative costs of 1 year of venetoclax/obinutuzumab with ibrutinib (Imbruvica)-based therapy. The results indicated that time-limited treatment with venetoclax/obinutuzumab is significantly more cost effective than continuous therapy with BTK-based therapy, says Davids. However, due to the preliminary nature of the study, longer-term follow-up will be needed to confirm these findings.