• Josep Darbà and Meritxell Ascanio.
• Department of Economics, Universitat de Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain.
• Curr Med Res Opin. 2021 Jan 1; 37 (1): 37-43.

ObjectiveTo identify and evaluate the Spanish diabetes mellitus type 2 patients' preferences on injection and medication frequency and complexity of the treatment of diabetes. Additionally, patients' willingness to pay is evaluated.MethodsA total of 180 patients recruited from five health care centres in Spain completed a discrete choice experiment survey designed to evaluate patients' preferences over three attributes discriminating by age, sex and patients experience with previous treatment. The resulting model was analysed using a conditional (fixed-effects) logistic regression.ResultsNaïve and non-naïve patients were willing to pay 83.25€ for a 'no preparation required' dose. In addition, both groups of patients were willing to pay 44.30€ for a 'simple preparation' dose. In terms of treatment frequency, no-naïve patients preferred a daily injection with freedom of timing before a daily scheduled injection, willing to pay 22.20€. In addition, no-naïve patients were willing to pay 34.61€ for a weekly injection. Finally, the most valued treatment change in naïve patients was to exchange a daily scheduled injection for a weekly injection, willing to pay 14.35€ for that change.ConclusionsThis study shows that patients highly value the avoidance of injections, with weekly dosing clearly preferred over daily dosing. Of the other attributes, a 'no preparation required' dose is clearly preferred over a 'simple preparation' dose. These findings may provide a better understanding of what patients prefer and value in their treatment and provide guidance for clinicians making therapeutic decisions regarding T2DM treatments.

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