Do We Always Need a New Preference Study? A Scoping Review of Promising Research Areas for Meta-Analyses and Benefit Transfers of Patient Preference Studies

Objectives

Although patient preference (PP) studies are costly, time intensive, and burdensome on patients, their findings are rarely used beyond the purpose of the original study. If PP study findings could be transferred to other contexts through meta-regression (benefit transfers), resources could be better utilized. We conducted a scoping review to assess the readiness of the current PP study landscape for evidence synthesis and benefit transfers.

Methods

Quantitative PP studies examining risks and benefits of treatments were identified through a systematic search on PubMed, Scopus, and Web of Science. Based on benefit transfer guidelines from environmental economics, prospects for transferring PP study findings were judged based on the number of studies across indications, consistency in elicitation methods, consistency in treatment attributes, and consistency in computed preference parameters.

Results

In total, 777 studies were included. Of these, 580 were discrete choice experiments (DCEs). Geographically, most studies were conducted in the United States (N = 271), multicountry designs (N = 105), Germany (N = 61), the United Kingdom (N = 59), and The Netherlands (N = 54). Indication wise, most research was concentrated in type 2 diabetes (T2D) (46 DCEs, 7 non-DCEs), psoriasis (24 DCEs, 8 non-DCEs), and multiple sclerosis (21 DCEs, 7 non-DCEs).

Conclusions

The landscape of PP studies is dispersed across various indications and therapeutic focus areas, which generally limits interstudy comparisons. However, numerous DCEs on T2D exhibited a high consistency in computed preference parameters and a moderately high degree of overlap in studied attributes (hypoglycemia, glycemic control, weight change, and out-of-pocket costs). Hence, benefit transfers seem feasible in T2D.