Adherence and treatment discontinuation of oral semaglutide and once‐weekly semaglutide injection at 12 month follow‐up: Japanese real‐world data
Takeshi Horii, Chikako Masudo, Yui Takayanagi, Yoichi Oikawa, Akira Shimada, Kiyoshi Mihara
Abstract
Adherence and treatment continuation rates of the glucagon-like peptide-1 receptor agonist (GLP-1RA) semaglutide for both oral (O-SEMA) and subcutaneous injection (SEMA-SC) remain unknown in real-world clinical practice. This retrospective observational study compared the 12 month adherence and treatment discontinuation of O-SEMA and once-weekly SEMA-SC in patients with type 2 diabetes using a real-world claims database. SEMA-SC initiators were 1:1 propensity score-matched to O-SEMA initiators. Non-adherence was defined as <0.8 of the proportion of days covered. SEMA-SC had a significantly higher odds ratio (OR) for non-adherence than O-SEMA (OR: 1.39). The hazard ratio for treatment discontinuation, using O-SEMA as the reference, was 1.45 for SEMA-SC, although the discontinuation rate of O-SEMA was higher during the early stage. O-SEMA initiators showed significantly higher adherence and greater persistence in therapy than SEMA-SC initiators at 12 months, which could lead to earlier initiation of GLP-1RA treatment.