Considering When to Switch Patients From One Biosimilar to Another

With more and more biosimilars reaching market, there are considerations around whether to keep patients on their current biosimilar or switch them to another biosimilar as the market dictates, said Paul Forsberg, PharmD, director of pharmacy, Minnesota Oncology.

Transcript

Does Minnesota Oncology have experience switching patients between biosimilars, not just between the reference product and a biosimilar?

We initially launched with biosimilars, and the initial change was going from a reference product over to a biosimilar. At that time, we had conversations, and we created a strategy on, do we do new patients only or do we do just new patients and convert existing patients from reference product over to biosimilars?

Now that we're into the biosimilar journey about 2 years, we're having those same conversations about, do we maintain patients on that existing biosimilar or as the market dictates whether it be from a payer standpoint, whether it's from an internal P&T [pharmacy and therapeutics committee] standpoint, we want to pivot between biosimilar products or supply changes with the biosimilars, are we able to move from biosimilar to biosimilar?

We have had success moving patients from one biosimilar to another biosimilar product, but that's going to be part of that continual biosimilar journey as we evaluate the landscape and determine what's going to be the best outcomes for our patient, not only from a quality and safety standpoint. As we've seen biosimilars launch, we're seeing patients save a significant amount in out-of-pocket expenses associated with their care, and we want to make sure we maintain that with their treatments.