What considerations did the committee decide for cost-effectiveness of beta-blockers for patients with HF-REF and AF?
The committee discussed and agreed that an up-titration appointment would likely occur every 2 weeks and would most likely be in a community setting with a specialist nurse. The committee agreed a conservative appointment time of 30 minutes. The committee agreed to the chosen HRG codes for heart failure hospitalisation, and decided that a weighted average of these codes based on activity would be the most suitable as an average cost of heart failure hospitalisation. The committee stated that stroke events in patients with chronic heart failure and AF are likely to be of greater severity and therefore of higher cost. Given that the committee found that the clinical evidence for the use of beta-blockers compared with placebo for all outcomes was highly uncertain, the committee could not determine cost-effectiveness with any certainty, and therefore agreed to incorporate this in the research recommendation.