Cost-effectiveness of treatment optimisation with biomarkers for immunotherapy in solid tumours: A systematic review protocol

Introduction The combination of biomarkers and drugs is the subject of growing interest both from regulators, physicians and companies. This study protocol of a systematic review is aimed to describe available literature evidences about the cost-effectiveness, cost-utility or net-monetary benefit of the use of biomarkers in solid tumour as tools for customising immunotherapy to identify what further research needs. Methods and analysis A systematic review of the literature will be carried out according to the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses statement guidelines. PubMed and Embase will be queried from June 2010 to June 2021. The PICOS model will be applied: target population (P) will be patients with solid tumours treated with immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICIs); the interventions (I) will be test of the immune checkpoint predictive biomarkers; the comparator (C) will be any other targeted or non-targeted therapy; outcomes (O) evaluated will be health economic and clinical implications assessed in terms of incremental cost-effectiveness ratio, net health benefit, net monetary benefit, life years gained, quality of life, etc; study (S) considered will be economic evaluations reporting cost-effectiveness analysis, cost-utility analysis, net-monetary benefit. The quality of the evidence will be graded according to Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development and Evaluation. Ethics and dissemination This systematic review will assess the cost-effectiveness implications of using biomarkers in the immunotherapy with ICIs, which may help to understand whether this approach is widespread in real clinical practice. This research is exempt from ethics approval because the work is carried out on published documents. We will disseminate this protocol in a related peer-reviewed journal. PROSPERO registration number CRD42020201549.