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. 2018 Mar 9;18(1):69.
doi: 10.1186/s12877-018-0751-1.

Health economic evaluations of non-pharmacological interventions for persons with dementia and their informal caregivers: a systematic review

Franziska Nickel  1   2 , Janina Barth  3   4 , Peter L Kolominsky-Rabas  3   4
Affiliations

Health economic evaluations of non-pharmacological interventions for persons with dementia and their informal caregivers: a systematic review

Franziska Nickel et al. BMC Geriatr. .

Abstract

Background: This systematic review aims to review the literature on trial-based economic evaluations of non-pharmacological interventions directly targeted at persons with dementia as well as persons with mild cognitive impairment and their respective caregivers.

Methods: A systematic literature research was conducted for the timeframe from 2010 to 2016 in the following databases: Centre for Reviews and Dissemination, EconLit, Embase, Cochrane Library, PsycINFO and PubMed. Study quality was assessed according to the Drummond criteria.

Results: In total sixteen publications were identified. Health economic evaluations indicated the cost-effectiveness of physical exercise interventions and occupational therapy. There was also evidence to suggest that psychological and behavioral therapies are cost-effective. Health economic studies investigating psychosocial interventions mainly targeted towards informal caregivers showed inconsistent results.

Conclusions: Due to the increasing prevalence of dementia non-pharmacological interventions and their health economic impact are of increasing importance for health care decision-makers and HTA agencies.

Keywords: Cost-effectiveness; Costs; Dementia; Economic evaluation; Non-pharmacological interventions.

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Conflict of interest statement

Ethics approval and consent to participate

Not applicable.

Consent for publication

Not applicable.

Competing interests

The authors declare that they have no competing interests.

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Figures

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Fig. 1
PRISMA flow chart
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