Authors :
Presenting Author: Thomas Finnegan, PhD – Medscape Education
Katie Lucero, PhD – Medscape Education
Kathy Merlo, PhD – Medscape Education
Jovana Lubarda, PhD – Medscape Education
Rationale:
The primary goals of epilepsy treatment are the achievement of seizure freedom with minimal adverse events. Up to 50% of patients with epilepsy continue to experience seizures after starting an initial antiseizure medication (ASM) or many are non-adherent to treatment due to bothersome adverse events. Despite newer ASMs offering benefits in seizure reduction and or tolerability, such therapies remain underutilized. A study was undertaken to determine if neurologists increase the prescription of newer ASMs after participating in a series of medical education programs highlighting the clinical evidence of newer therapies in clinical practice.
Methods:
A self-directed online curriculum of 3 CME activities was offered. Neurologist learners across the 3 CME programs were matched to claims data to identify them as prescribers of newer ASMs (defined as: brivaracetam, cenobamate, eslicarbazepine, lacosamide, and perampanel) in the 6 months prior to participation and 3 months after program participation relative to a propensity matched group of neurologists who did not participate in the educational programming. McNemar’s and independent samples t-tests assessed statistical significance. Data collection occurred from December 2023 through September 2024.
Results:
239 learners had complete data and were matched to 239 non-learners. Learners and non-learners were similarly matched based on the average number of epilepsy patients seen, average number of patients with epilepsy on a newer ASM prior to education, and average number of patients on a newer ASM as prescribed by any HCP after visiting the learner/non-learner. Analysis of claims data showed that learners prescribed a larger volume of newer anti-seizure medications relative to non-learners in the 3 months following participation in the CME programming. There was no evidence of substantial prescribing differences among learner based on geographic location within the United States. Learners who self-reported being an epileptologists had nearly twice as many patients on a newer ASM relative to non-epileptologist neurologist learners. Supporting the increased use of newer ASMs, learners demonstrated an average 36% improvement (p< 0.001) across the 3 CME programs on pre-post questions related to the clinical use of newer ASMs. Learners also reported a 16% improvement in confidence relating to the personalizing the selection of ASMs after participating in the education.