Medication use of ILI patients.

<p>Number of respondents using different types of medication, separately for medication bought in the pharmacy and medication that respondents had in storage at home. Each respondent could specify several types of medication bought or at home. ‘Don’t know’ refers to medication taken without being sure about which type.</p

Quality-Adjusted Life-Years lost for ambulatory ILI patients.

<p>Estimated average Quality-Adjusted Life-Years lost as a function of having an underlying illness and age, separately for ambulatory ILI respondents categorized as ‘likely flu’ or ‘unlikely flu’.</p

Costs for ambulatory ILI patients.

<p>Estimated average direct medical cost (€, using lowest unit cost for medication) as a function of having an underlying illness and age, separately for ambulatory ILI respondents categorized as ‘likely flu’ or ‘unlikely flu’.</p

Estimated direct medical cost and quality-of-life associated with ILI and clinically diagnosed flu patients in Belgium, as a function of significant predictor variables (gender, underlying condition ‘cond’, age and/or vaccination status (‘vac’ = vaccinated just before or during the last flu season)).

<p>95% uncertainty intervals are obtained by bootstrapping (1000 samples). #Age was included as continuous predictor variable in the regression models but for clarity this table presents estimates for only 3 ages (in years).</p

Influenza-Like-Illness and Clinically Diagnosed Flu: Disease Burden, Costs and Quality of Life for Patients Seeking Ambulatory Care or No Professional Care at All

<div><p>This is one of the first studies to (1) describe the out-of-hospital burden of influenza-like-illness (ILI) and clinically diagnosed flu, also for patients not seeking professional medical care, (2) assess influential background characteristics, and (3) formally compare the burden of ILI in patients with and without a clinical diagnosis of flu. A general population sample with recent ILI experience was recruited during the 2011–2012 influenza season in Belgium. Half of the 2250 respondents sought professional medical care, reported more symptoms (especially more often fever), a longer duration of illness, more use of medication (especially antibiotics) and a higher direct medical cost than patients not seeking medical care. The disease and economic burden were similar for ambulatory ILI patients, irrespective of whether they received a clinical diagnosis of flu. On average, they experienced 5–6 symptoms over a 6-day period; required 1.6 physician visits and 86–91% took medication. An average episode amounted to €51–€53 in direct medical costs, 4 days of absence from work or school and the loss of 0.005 quality-adjusted life-years. Underlying illness led to greater costs and lower quality-of-life. The costs of ILI patients with clinically diagnosed flu tended to increase, while those of ILI patients without clinically diagnosed flu tended to decrease with age. Recently vaccinated persons experienced lower costs and a higher quality-of-life, but this was only the case for patients not seeking professional medical care. This information can be used directly to evaluate the implementation of cost-effective prevention and control measures for influenza. In particular to inform the evaluation of more widespread seasonal influenza vaccination, including in children, which is currently considered by many countries.</p></div

General characteristics of the included systematic reviews.

a<p>A = amantadine; O = oseltamivir; Z = zanamivir; P = peramivir; L = laninamivir.</p>b<p>N = number of trials included in SR.</p

List of excluded reviews with reasons.

<p>List of excluded reviews with reasons.</p

Adverse events of oseltamivir and zanamivir versus placebo in prophylaxis and treatment trials (ITT – pooled results).

a<p>O = treatmet trial 150 mg oseltamivir daily during 5 days in adults, elderly; dosage adjusted to weight in children; prophylaxis trial = treatment dosage/2.</p>b<p>Z = treatmet trial 2×10 mg inhaled zanamivir daily during 5 days in adults, elderly; dosage adjusted to weight in children; prophylaxis trial = treatment dosage/2.</p>c<p>odds ratio and risk difference (Wang).</p>d<p>no pooling of results.</p>e<p>GRADE quality of evidence: high; moderate; low.</p><p>ITT = intention-to-treat; NI = neuraminidase inhibitor; CI = confidence interval.</p

Treatment effect of oseltamivir and zanamivir versus placebo in healthy adults, children, elderly and at-risk populations (ITT – pooled results).

a<p>O = 150 mg oseltamivir daily during 5 days in adults, elderly; dosage adjusted to weight in children.</p>b<p>Z = 2×10 mg inhaled zanamivir daily during 5 days in adults, elderly; dosage adjusted to weight in children.</p>c<p>difference in median hours in oseltamivir trials and difference in median days in zanamivir trials.</p>d<p>no pooling of results.</p>e<p>GRADE quality of evidence: high; moderate; low.</p><p>ITT = intention-to-treat; NI = neuraminidase inhibitor; CI = confidence interval.</p

AMSTAR quality appraisal of the included SRs.

<p>SR = systematic review; NA = not applicable.</p