Lamivudine spares resources in HIV infection, reveals CAESAR study

Abstract

I ncluding lamivudine in HIV combination therapy not only slows progression of HIV-1 infection, but reduces the number of hospitalisations, outpatient visits and prescribed medications for HIV-related illness, according to the findings of a prospective economic analysis of the CAESAR multinational clinical trial. * In particular, applying these resource use data to country-specific unit costs showed that adding lamivudine to zidovudine-based regimens reduces the costs of treating HIV-related illness and adverse events, and that this completely or partially offsets the additional acquisition cost of lamivudine. **