Inequality in Drug Utilization among Chronic Myeloid Leukaemia Patients in Malaysia: A Cost-Utility Analysis

Medicines represent one of the most frequently used health technology components for disease prevention and treatment. More than 24% of global total health expenditure is on drug purchasing (Milani and Scholten, 2011). In developing countries, a significant amount of pharmaceutical spending is paid out-of-pocket by individuals (Du et al., 2019; Kong et al., 2010; Lu et al., 2011), which imposes a substantial financial burden on patients and presents an increased challenge for care providers, particularly for cancer drugs. To ensure universal healthcare coverage, many countries introduced patient assistance programmes to ensure the availability of affordable treatment in sufficient quantities and to improve access to medicines likely to Abstract