Introduction Gastrointestinal haemorrhage due to vascular malformations has a negative impact on patients’ quality of life and consumes an important quantity of resources.

Objective Analyse the cost-effectiveness of long-active releasing octreotide (OCT-LAR) in the treatment of gastrointestinal haemorrhage secondary to vascular malformations.

Method Retrospective study, including 19 pacients that were treated with mensual injections of OCTLAR between 2008–2013. The number of blood transfusions, haemoglobin levels, hospital admissions and possible side effects during the year before treatment and the year after the start of the treatment were assessed, and cost-effectiveness was analysed.

Results After the beginning of the treatment with OCTLAR, complete response was observed in 7 patients (36.8%), partial response in 7 patients (36.8%) and 5 patients (26.3%) continued to require admissions, blood transfusions and/or endoscopic treatment. We observed significant reduction in the length of admission per year (in days) before and after the start of the treatment (22.79 vs. 2.01 days, p < 0.0001) as well as in the number of blood transfusions administered (11.19 vs. 2.55 blood transfusions per year, p = 0.002). The mean haemoglobin levels increased from 6.9 g/dl to 10.62 g/dl (p < 0.0001). We observed reduction of costs of 61.5% between the two periods (from 36,072.35 to 13,867.57 €, p = 0.01). No side effects related to treatment were described.

Conclusion In conclusion, OCT-LAR seems to be a cost efficient and safe pharmacological treatment of gastrointestinal haemorrhage secondary to vascular malformations, mainly in patients in whom endoscopic or surgical treatment is contraindicated.

Disclosure of interest None Declared.

Reference

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