Economic Evaluation in Kidney Transplantation: A Scoping Review and Novel PESTLE Stakeholder Gaps Analysis

Aim: The objective of this study was to systematically review the literature related to the economic evaluation of kidney transplantation to determine the extent of current research and identify gaps for future research.

Subject and methods: We searched 4 medical and 2 economic electronic databases as well as hand-searching reference lists of review articles and other pertinent articles. Exclusion criteria included articles that did not include original work (ie, reviews), were not in English, and were not journal articles or economic working papers (eg, commentaries, theses, abstracts). Full-text data abstraction included qualitative and quantitative parameters with the intent to perform a gap analysis for future research.

Results: A total of 299 articles were included and spanned a 48-year period from 1968 to 2016, with >73% published in 2000 or after. The most common topics included immunosuppression drugs, dialysis vs kidney transplantation, organ allocation, and the potential market for donor organs. Most articles were from the United States and originated from 73 medical journals and 34 economic journals or working paper centers. There were 58 articles dealing with costing, 153 using cost-effectiveness, 69 using economic modeling, 6 performing systematic reviews with meta-analyses, and 13 exploring the qualitative financial environment of individuals and the economy.

Conclusions: Research gaps were identified in every parameter used to evaluate the studies, and a new system of gap analysis for scoping reviews was also proposed.