Uses and Applications of Eq-5d in Latin America & the Caribbean: Systematic Review and Bibliometric Analysis

• Published in: Value in health Vol. 20; no. 9; pp. A908 - A909
• Main Authors: Rey-Ares, L, Hernández-Vásquez, A, Irazola, V, Comande, D, Augustovski, F
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Lawrenceville Elsevier Science Ltd 01-10-2017
• Subjects: Bibliometrics; Clinical research; Clinical trials; Health economics; Meta-analysis; Observational studies; Polls & surveys; Questionnaires; Reviews; Specification; Systematic review; Validation studies; Validity; Latin America
• ISSN: 1098-3015; 1524-4733
• DOI: 10.1016/j.jval.2017.08.2801

OBJECTIVES: To systematically review and describe the uses and applications of the EQ-5D in LA&C countries. METHODS: We conducted a systematic review and a bibliometric analysis. We searched in PubMed, Web of Science, Scopus, Lilacs, Embase, the EuroQpl website and in generic Internet engines (June 2016). We included studies (without temporal or language restrictions) that were conducted in or reported data from one or more LA&C countries using any version of the EQ-5D. RESULTS: From 537 retrieved articles, 189 met the inclusion criteria. More than half publications were journal publications (109; 57.4%); 39.5% (74) were conference abstracts, and 3.2% (6) were theses. The number of LA&C participants ranged from 4 in a multi-country clinical trial to 41,392 in a population survey. Twenty-seven publications reported data from more than one country, 9 of these studies were reported as being conducted in Latin America or South America without country specification. Most publications (162,85.7%) were about single country studies. Brazil (28%), Mexico (18.5%) and Argentina (13.2%) were the nations were most studies were conducted. Temporal trends showed a steady increase in the number of publications from 2005 to 2015 when the maximum was reached (43; 22.8%). Most publications were observational studies (65.6%), followed by clinical trials, economic evaluations and validation studies (each type with 12 studies, representing 6.3%).The most frequent EQ-5D use was clinical 129 (68.3%). Other uses included health economics (21; 11.1%) and other uses like population health surveys, questionnaire validation or methodological studies (39; 20.6%). CONCLUSIONS: The utilization of EQ-5D has been increasing in the region in the last decade, but is still limited to a few countries. It is most commonly used in clinical studies. This review may help assemble a repository of local health states and utilities for different clinical conditions to be used in economic evaluations.