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Economic evaluations of contingency management in illicit drug misuse programmes: A systematic review
Author(s) -
Shearer James,
Tie Hiong,
Byford Sarah
Publication year - 2015
Publication title -
drug and alcohol review
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.018
H-Index - 74
eISSN - 1465-3362
pISSN - 0959-5236
DOI - 10.1111/dar.12240
Subject(s) - abstinence , contingency management , cost effectiveness , systematic review , economic evaluation , medicine , health economics , health care , cost–benefit analysis , evidence based practice , alternative medicine , medline , psychiatry , family medicine , nursing , risk analysis (engineering) , public health , political science , intervention (counseling) , pathology , law
Issues UK clinical guidelines published in 2007 recommended contingency management ( CM ) as an adjunct to opiate substitution therapy. However, CM has not been adopted in the UK despite evidence of clinical effectiveness. Evidence for the cost‐effectiveness of CM is less clear and will need to be explored if CM is to be adopted by national health systems in countries such as the UK .Approach Systematic review and descriptive synthesis of published economic evaluations. Key Findings The review identified nine published studies that could be classified as economic evaluations. These were all based within US treatment settings, and five were conducted by the same group of authors. All studies found that the addition of CM to usual care increased both costs and effects (commonly drug abstinence or medication adherence). Implications This review confirms that the existing evidence base for cost‐effectiveness has limited generalisability beyond the original research clinical settings and populations. Conclusion The data were not sufficiently strong to make any conclusion about the cost‐effectiveness of CM . More relevant and comprehensive evidence for cost‐effectiveness than currently exists is needed. [Shearer J, Tie H, Byford S. Economic evaluations of contingency management in illicit drug misuse programmes: A systematic review. Drug Alcohol Rev 2015]