Rick,
You're a fountain of knowledge in this; my most sincere thanks.
Has anyone read this paper? If so, do you recall what the sample size was? If it was respectable, then it's exactly the type of argument that'll appeal to an actuary at an insurance company.
Moreover, note that the Dutch system isn't as lititigous as ours and thus the cost benefits are almost certainly higher by a good margin in the US.
By the way, for those of you who may not know, actuaries are usually well hidden inside companies that deal with liability issues. They aren't normally public figures, but they *are* the ones who determine expected costs. If you need to build a highrise building, they'll estimate the number of people who'll likely be killed - a floating point number - and the expected costs associated.
Incidentally, an actuary would not look very favorably at the current trend in cancer treatment since it means higher costs to the insurance companies. Whenever a generally fatal disease turns into a manageable disease, the costs to the insurance carriers go up since patients will need expensive drugs for much longer. Pancreatic cancer has to be one of the ``cheapest" cancers since it tends to be fatal in very short order. So from a business point of view, paying for ``experimental" treatments is bad news. Especially if they extend the life of the patient. Reimbursing for something like ADCON appears to be good from a business point of view since it reduces the likelihood of complications, reoperation and lawsuits. My best guess is that the insurance companies are perfectly willing to reimburse for ADCON-L; the key issue is probably *how much* they reimburse. My guess is that once the US plant is operational, Gliatech may be able to reduce the cost of ADCON-L while still keeping the margins up. This will help improve market penetration since the number of insurers who're reimbursing is going to be directly related to the cost.
Just my penny's worth.
Thanks, Torben |
