EXTON, Pa.— Six months after launching, the use of AMAG Pharmaceuticals' Feraheme is on the rise with 23 percent of nephrologists reporting use of the IV iron drug, according to new survey results from BioTrends Research Group.
The recent findings were Wave 3 of BioTrends’ “LaunchTrends: Feraheme” report, which has been tracking nephrologists’ use of AMAG’s new iron drug. Each wave provides quantitative information from 50 unique nephrologists and qualitative information from a subset of 15 nephrologists.
For the first time in this report series, nephrologists reported using Feraheme in all patient segments: hemodialysis (HD), peritoneal dialysis (PD) and chronic kidney disease-non dialysis (CKD-ND) patients, according to BioTrends.
Overall, Feraheme users report positive experiences in terms of efficacy, safety and ease of administration/convenience, according to BioTrends. The vast majority of users have not experienced any safety issues with the product, and some nephrologists feel Feraheme may be safer than the other available IV iron products.
Lack of availability where patients receive IV iron and uncertainty regarding cost and insurance coverage are the greatest barriers to use of Feraheme in CKD-ND patients, although the majority of Feraheme users report reimbursement is comparable or better than the competitive products, according to BioTrends.
Nephrologists project continued near-term increases in their use of the product in all patient segments, according to the results. They expect Feraheme use in HD to most negatively impact Ferrlecit while use in PD and CKD-ND is expected to negatively impact both Venofer and Ferrlecit.
In addition to gaining share from other products, nephrologists expect Feraheme to increase their overall use of IV iron in PD and CKD-ND patients, and have a negative impact on their use of erythropoiesis-stimulating agents (ESAs), according to BioTrends.
