The cost-effectiveness of oral triptan therapy in Sweden

The literature suggests that triptans are cost effective compared with older types of migraine treatment. However, which of the triptans that is most cost effective has not been established. We compared the costs and effects of triptan treatment from a Swedish societal perspective, using evidence from the literature. A probabilistic cost-effectiveness model was constructed to investigate the costs and effects of treating a single attack in a typical migraine patient. The end-point used in the base-case analysis was sustained pain free without any adverse events (SNAE). We searched the scientific literature for meta-analyses reporting the efficacy of oral triptans. All treatments except rizatriptan 10 mg and eletriptan 40 mg were dominated. The incremental cost per SNAE of rizatriptan 10 mg compared with eletriptan 40 mg was approximately 100 euro. There was substantial uncertainty concerning the results, but probabilistic analysis showed that rizatriptan 10 mg and eletriptan 40 mg had the highest probability of being cost-effective.