An in silico framework for integrating epidemiologic and genetic evidence with health care applications: ventilation-related pneumothorax as a case illustration

OBJECTIVE: To illustrate an in silico integration of epidemiologic and genetic evidence that is being developed at the Center for Devices and Radiological Health/US Food and Drug Administration as part of regulatory research on postmarket device performance. In addition to using conventional epidemiologic evidence from registries, this innovative approach explores the vast potential of open-access omics databases for identifying genetic evidence pertaining to devices. MATERIAL AND METHODS: A retrospective analysis of Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ)/Healthcare Cost and Utilization Project (HCUPNet) data (2002-2011) was focused on the ventilation-related iatrogenic pneumothorax (Vent-IP) outcome in discharges with mechanical ventilation (MV) and continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP). The derived epidemiologic evidence was analyzed in conjunction with pre-existing genomic data from Gene Expression Omnibus/National Center for Biotechnology Information and other databases. RESULTS: AHRQ/HCUPNet epidemiologic evidence showed that annual occurrence of Vent-IP did not decrease over a decade. While the Vent-IP risk associated with noninvasive CPAP comprised about 0.5%, the Vent-IP risk due to longer-term MV reached 2%. Along with MV posing an independent risk for Vent-IP, female sex and white race were found to be effect modifiers, resulting in the highest Vent-IP risk among mechanically ventilated white females. The Vent-IP risk was also potentiated by comorbidities associated with spontaneous pneumothorax (SP) and fibrosis. Consistent with the epidemiologic evidence, expression profiling in a number of animal models showed that the expression of several collagens and other SP/fibrosis-related genes was modified by ventilation settings. CONCLUSION: Integration of complementary genetic evidence into epidemiologic analysis can lead to a cost- and time-efficient discovery of the risk predictors and markers and thus can facilitate more efficient marker-based evaluation of medical product performance

Evaluation of an automated safety surveillance system using risk adjusted sequential probability ratio testing

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Automated adverse outcome surveillance tools and methods have potential utility in quality improvement and medical product surveillance activities. Their use for assessing hospital performance on the basis of patient outcomes has received little attention. We compared risk-adjusted sequential probability ratio testing (RA-SPRT) implemented in an automated tool to Massachusetts public reports of 30-day mortality after isolated coronary artery bypass graft surgery.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>A total of 23,020 isolated adult coronary artery bypass surgery admissions performed in Massachusetts hospitals between January 1, 2002 and September 30, 2007 were retrospectively re-evaluated. The RA-SPRT method was implemented within an automated surveillance tool to identify hospital outliers in yearly increments. We used an overall type I error rate of 0.05, an overall type II error rate of 0.10, and a threshold that signaled if the odds of dying 30-days after surgery was at least twice than expected. Annual hospital outlier status, based on the state-reported classification, was considered the gold standard. An event was defined as at least one occurrence of a higher-than-expected hospital mortality rate during a given year.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>We examined a total of 83 hospital-year observations. The RA-SPRT method alerted 6 events among three hospitals for 30-day mortality compared with 5 events among two hospitals using the state public reports, yielding a sensitivity of 100% (5/5) and specificity of 98.8% (79/80).</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>The automated RA-SPRT method performed well, detecting all of the true institutional outliers with a small false positive alerting rate. Such a system could provide confidential automated notification to local institutions in advance of public reporting providing opportunities for earlier quality improvement interventions.</p

Data sources and applied methods for paclitaxel safety signal discernment

Background Following the identification of a late mortality signal, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) convened an advisory panel that concluded that additional clinical study data are needed to comprehensively evaluate the late mortality signal observed with the use of drug-coated balloons (DCB) and drug-eluting stent (DES). The objective of this review is to (1) identify and summarize the existing clinical and cohort studies assessing paclitaxel-coated DCBs and DESs, (2) describe and determine the quality of the available data sources for the evaluation of these devices, and (3) present methodologies that can be leveraged for proper signal discernment within available data sources. Methods Studies and data sources were identified through comprehensive searches. original research studies, clinical trials, comparative studies, multicenter studies, and observational cohort studies written in the English language and published from January 2007 to November 2021, with a follow-up longer than 36 months, were included in the review. Data quality of available data sources identified was assessed in three groupings. Moreover, accepted data-driven methodologies that may help circumvent the limitations of the extracted studies and data sources were extracted and described. Results There were 39 studies and data sources identified. This included 19 randomized clinical trials, nine single-arm studies, eight registries, three administrative claims, and electronic health records. Methodologies focusing on the use of existing premarket clinical data, the incorporation of all contributed patient time, the use of aggregated data, approaches for individual-level data, machine learning and artificial intelligence approaches, Bayesian approaches, and the combination of various datasets were summarized. Conclusion Despite the multitude of available studies over the course of eleven years following the first clinical trial, the FDA-convened advisory panel found them insufficient for comprehensively assessing the late-mortality signal. High-quality data sources with the capabilities of employing advanced statistical methodologies are needed to detect potential safety signals in a timely manner and allow regulatory bodies to act quickly when a safety signal is detected

Data sources and applied methods for paclitaxel safety signal discernment

BackgroundFollowing the identification of a late mortality signal, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) convened an advisory panel that concluded that additional clinical study data are needed to comprehensively evaluate the late mortality signal observed with the use of drug-coated balloons (DCB) and drug-eluting stent (DES). The objective of this review is to (1) identify and summarize the existing clinical and cohort studies assessing paclitaxel-coated DCBs and DESs, (2) describe and determine the quality of the available data sources for the evaluation of these devices, and (3) present methodologies that can be leveraged for proper signal discernment within available data sources.MethodsStudies and data sources were identified through comprehensive searches. original research studies, clinical trials, comparative studies, multicenter studies, and observational cohort studies written in the English language and published from January 2007 to November 2021, with a follow-up longer than 36 months, were included in the review. Data quality of available data sources identified was assessed in three groupings. Moreover, accepted data-driven methodologies that may help circumvent the limitations of the extracted studies and data sources were extracted and described.ResultsThere were 39 studies and data sources identified. This included 19 randomized clinical trials, nine single-arm studies, eight registries, three administrative claims, and electronic health records. Methodologies focusing on the use of existing premarket clinical data, the incorporation of all contributed patient time, the use of aggregated data, approaches for individual-level data, machine learning and artificial intelligence approaches, Bayesian approaches, and the combination of various datasets were summarized.ConclusionDespite the multitude of available studies over the course of eleven years following the first clinical trial, the FDA-convened advisory panel found them insufficient for comprehensively assessing the late-mortality signal. High-quality data sources with the capabilities of employing advanced statistical methodologies are needed to detect potential safety signals in a timely manner and allow regulatory bodies to act quickly when a safety signal is detected

Registry-Based Prospective, Active Surveillance Of Medical-Device Safety

BACKGROUND The process of assuring the safety of medical devices is constrained by reliance on voluntary reporting of adverse events. We evaluated a strategy of prospective, active surveillance of a national clinical registry to monitor the safety of an implantable vascular-closure device that had a suspected association with increased adverse events after percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI). METHODS We used an integrated clinical-data surveillance system to conduct a prospective, propensity-matched analysis of the safety of the Mynx vascular-closure device, as compared with alternative approved vascular-closure devices, with data from the CathPCI Registry of the National Cardiovascular Data Registry. The primary outcome was any vascular complication, which was a composite of access-site bleeding, access- site hematoma, retroperitoneal bleeding, or any vascular complication requiring intervention. Secondary safety end points were access-site bleeding requiring treatment and postprocedural blood transfusion. RESULTS We analyzed data from 73,124 patients who had received Mynx devices after PCI procedures with femoral access from January 1, 2011, to September 30, 2013. The Mynx device was associated with a significantly greater risk of any vascular complication than were alternative vascular-closure devices (absolute risk, 1.2% vs. 0.8%; relative risk, 1.59; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.42 to 1.78; P\u3c0.001); there was also a significantly greater risk of access-site bleeding (absolute risk, 0.4% vs. 0.3%; relative risk, 1.34; 95% CI, 1.10 to 1.62; P = 0.001) and transfusion (absolute risk, 1.8% vs. 1.5%; relative risk, 1.23; 95% CI, 1.13 to 1.34; P\u3c0.001). The initial alerts occurred within the first 12 months of monitoring. Relative risks were greater in three prespecified high-risk subgroups: patients with diabetes, those 70 years of age or older, and women. All safety alerts were confirmed in an independent sample of 48,992 patients from April 1, 2014, to September 30, 2015. CONCLUSIONS A strategy of prospective, active surveillance of a clinical registry rapidly identified potential safety signals among recipients of an implantable vascular-closure device, with initial alerts occurring within the first 12 months of monitoring

COMPARATIVE EFFECTIVENESS A Framework for Evidence Evaluation and Methodological Issues in Implantable Device Studies

Abstract: Implantable medical devices (IMD) are frequently used in interventional medicine. There are a host of complex methodological issues to consider in conducting device studies. A general conceptual framework for evidence evaluation is needed to help investigators conduct comparative studies in this setting. It is known that clinical trials of implants require study design planning and creative execution that are quite different from those in pharmaceutical setting. Important study design issues such as randomization, masking and allocation concealment require unique approaches for each device. In addition, device comparative studies must cope with sources of variability different from pharmaceutical studies. These include operator learning curve effects, hospital-operator-patient interactions, and issues related to device technical characteristics. Observational studies of IMDs are particularly challenging. Selection of comparison groups, adjusting for confounding and addressing learning curve issues needs careful planning. We propose a general framework for IMD evaluation and provide an outline of the methodological issues that require further discussion. We hope this article will inspire and help to inform those interested in advancing comparative safety and effectiveness of IMDs and to plan and pursue future methodological work in this area

Real-world study of mortality after the Use of Paclitaxel-coated Devices in Peripheral Vascular Intervention

OBJECTIVES: To examine outcomes after peripheral vascular intervention (PVI) with paclitaxel-coated devices (PCD) and non-PCD and evaluate heterogeneity of treatment effect in populations of interest. DESIGN: Observational cohort study. METHODS: We included patients undergoing percutaneous transluminal angioplasty and/or stent placement during 1/10/2015-31/12/2018 in the Vascular Quality Initiative Registry linked to Medicare claims. We determined differences in patient mortality and ipsilateral major amputation after PVI with PCD and non-PCD using Kaplan-Meier analyses and Cox regressions with inverse probability weighting in three cohorts: (A) patients treated for femoropopliteal or infrapopliteal occlusive disease with/without any other concurrent treatment (n=11 452), (B) those treated for isolated superficial-femoral or popliteal artery disease (n=5 519), and (C) patients with inclusion criteria designed to approximate RCT populations (n=2 278). RESULTS: The mean age of patients was 72.3 (SD=10.9) years, and 40.6% were female. In cohort A, patients receiving PCD had lower mortality (HR 0.88, 95% CI 0.79-0.98) than those receiving non-PCD. There was no significant difference in mortality between groups in cohort B (HR 0.91, 95% CI 0.80-1.04) and C (HR 1.10, 95% CI 0.84-1.43). Patients receiving PCD did not have a significantly elevated risk of major amputation compared with those receiving non-PCD (Cohort A: HR=0.84, 95% CI 0.70-1.00; B: HR=0.84, 95% CI 0.67-1.06; C: HR=1.05, 95% CI 0.51-2.14). CONCLUSIONS: We did not find increased patient mortality or major amputation at three years after PVI with PCD vs. non-PCD in this large, linked registry-claims study, after accounting for heterogeneity of treatment effect by population. Our analysis and results from three cohorts intended to mirror the cohorts of prior studies provide robust and niche real-world evidence on PCD safety and help understand and reconcile previously discrepant findings