One of the fundamental benefits of biosimilars is that, while they offer therapeutically equivalent outcomes to originator biotherapeutic medicines, they do so at a reduced cost.
The Basics
Benefits of biosimilars
Reduced costs
On a clinician level, this may enable clinicians to initiate treatment earlier (because it is now more affordable), whereas on a collective (or medical scheme) level, it means that more patients can be treated within the same budget.1 Due to the reduced costs, doctors are now in a position to prescribe high-quality, safe and efficacious medicines allowing more of their patients access to state-of-the-art treatment at earlier stages of diseases that are, in their course, disabling and/or life-threatening.
Value-added services for patient support
In addition, the availability of biosimilars drives competition and this in turn produces increased treatment options and value-added services to support patient care.5
A further benefit of biosimilar products is that their development may use the latest state-of-the-art analytical and biotechnology methods, which may include some that might not have been available when the originator (or reference) product was first approved.1
