Cost-effectiveness Analysis of Contralateral Prophylactic Mastectomy Compared to Unilateral Mastectomy with Routine Surveillance for Unilateral, Sporadic Breast Cancer

Abstract

Background

Contralateral prophylactic mastectomy (CPM) rates in younger women with unilateral breast cancer have more than doubled. Studies of cost and quality of life of the procedure remain inconclusive.

Methods

A cost-effectiveness analysis using a decision-tree model in TreeAge Pro 2015 was used to compare long-term costs and quality of life following unilateral mastectomy (UM) with routine surveillance versus CPM for sporadic breast cancer in women aged 45 years. A 10-year risk period for contralateral breast cancer (CBC), reconstruction, wound complications, cost of routine surveillance, and treatment for CBC were used to estimate accrued costs. In addition, a societal perspective was used to estimate quality-adjusted life years (QALYs) following either treatment for a period of 30 years. Medical costs were obtained from the 2014 Medicare physician fee schedule and event probabilities were taken from recent literature.

Results

The mean cost of UM with surveillance was $14,141 and CPM was $20,319. Treatment with CPM resulted in $6178 more in costs but equivalent QALYs (17.93) compared with UM over 30 years of follow-up. Even with worst-case scenario and varying assumptions, CPM is dominated by UM in terms of cost and quality.

Conclusions

From this refined model, UM with routine surveillance costs less and provides an equivalent quality of life. Patients undergoing CPM may eliminate the anxiety of routine surveillance, but they face the burden of higher lifetime medical costs.

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