Background characteristics of study participants (n = 35).

<p>Background characteristics of study participants (n = 35).</p

Residence of women included in the study.

<p>Red circles: <i>Plasmodium falciparum</i> malaria cases; Blue circles: <i>Plasmodium vivax</i> cases. Purple marker: San José hospital.</p

Baseline characteristics of study subjects (N = 40).

<p>Baseline characteristics of study subjects (N = 40).</p

Neonatal mortality: acceptability curve of the cost-effectiveness ratio of IPTp-SP^a vs hypothetical willingness to pay^b.

<p>^a Intermittent preventive treatment of malaria in pregnancy with sulphadoxine-pyrimethamine. ^b Acceptability curves were constructed by plotting the cumulative distribution of ICER of IPTp-SP per DALYs averted. The Y axis can be interpreted as probability that the intervention is cost-effective for every level of policy makers' ability or willingness to pay for each DALY averted (X axis).</p

Correlation of cost-effectiveness ratios, savings, and input variables (Spearman's Rank).

<p>^a Intermittent preventive treatment of malaria in pregnancy with sulphadoxine-pyrimethamine.^bAntenatal Clinic (ANC) attendance at least twice during pregnancy. ^c Rate per person-year at risk in the placebo group. ^d Drug costs for inpatients refers to intravenous quinine.^e Drug costs for outpatients are relative to artesunate plus SP. ^f It indicates the proportion of pregnant women with symptoms of malaria who seek formal health care.</p

Cost-effectiveness analysis of IPTp-SP^a for 1000 pregnant women^b.

a<p>Intermittent preventive treatment of malaria in pregnancy with sulphadoxine-pyrimethamine.</p>b<p>95% confidence intervals in brackets.</p>c<p>in US$ 2007.</p>d<p>Disability-adjusted life years.</p>e<p>Total number of episodes averted is theoretical and relies on the assumption that formal treatment is sought for any case of suspected malaria. The total number is higher than the sum of inpatients and outpatients episodes averted because number of outpatient episodes considers that only a proportion of pregnant women with symptoms of malaria, actually, seeks formal treatment.</p

Input variables of the probabilistic cost-effectiveness analysis of IPTp-SP^a.

a<p>Intermittent preventive treatment of malaria in pregnancy with sulphadoxine-pyrimethamine.</p>b<p>Tringular distribution was chosen to be consistent with previous similar studies <a href="http://www.plosone.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pone.0013407#pone.0013407-Hutton1" target="_blank">[53]</a>, <a href="http://www.plosone.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pone.0013407#pone.0013407-Conteh1" target="_blank">[58]</a>.</p>c<p>in US$ 2007.</p>d<p>Rate per person-year at risk in the placebo group.</p>e<p>It indicates the proportion of pregnant women with symptoms of malaria who seek formal health care. The values of the uniform distribution are adapted from Hutton et al <a href="http://www.plosone.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pone.0013407#pone.0013407-Hutton1" target="_blank">[53]</a></p>f<p>It is assumed that severe cases  =  hospitalized cases</p>g<p>The left limit of the confidence interval is negative due to bootstrapping.</p>h<p>Drug costs for inpatients refers to intravenous quinine.</p>i<p>Drug costs for outpatients refers to artesunate plus SP.</p>l<p>Seven newborns died during the first 28 days of life for each 495 pregnant women receiving SP and 18 newborns died for 493 pregnant women receiving placebo. Reduction of deaths per 1000 mothers receiving SP is equal to [number of deaths averted/number of mothers in SP group]*1000.</p

Residence of women included in the study.

<p>Red circles: <i>Plasmodium falciparum</i> malaria cases; Blue circles: <i>Plasmodium vivax</i> cases. Purple marker: San José hospital.</p

Characteristics of malaria episodes (N = 40).

<p>Characteristics of malaria episodes (N = 40).</p

Maternal malaria: acceptability curve of the cost-effectiveness ratio of IPTp-SP^a vs hypothetical willingness to pay^b.

<p>^a Intermittent preventive treatment of malaria in pregnancy with sulphadoxine-pyrimethamine. ^b Acceptability curves were constructed by plotting the cumulative distribution of ICER of IPTp-SP per DALYs averted. The Y axis can be interpreted as probability that the intervention is cost-effective for every level of policy makers' ability or willingness to pay for each DALY averted (X axis). * 36 US$per DALY averted = threshold of highly cost-effective intervention; 129 US$ per DALY averted = threshold of cost-effective intervention.</p