Real‐world characterisation of patients with chronic rhinosinusitis with nasal polyps with and without surgery in England

Objectives To characterise the real‐world burden of chronic rhinosinusitis with nasal polyps (CRSwNP) in the UK, stratified by number of surgeries. Design Retrospective cohort study. Setting UK Clinical Practice Research Datalink Aurum database with Hospital Episodes Statistics linkage (2007–2019). Participants Adults ≥18 years of age with a first NP diagnosis (index) and 365 days of baseline and ≥180 days of follow‐up data. Follow‐up continued until disenrollment, death or end of data collection. Main Outcome Measures Primary: primary care physician prescribed CRSwNP‐related treatments, and all‐cause healthcare resource utilisation (HCRU) in 90 days post‐index, stratified by surgeries during follow‐up. Secondary: rate of surgery and CRSwNP point prevalence. Baseline patient demographics, clinical characteristics and comorbidities were also assessed. Results Of the 33 107 patients included, 23.5% and 2.2% had ≥1 and ≥2 surgeries during follow‐up, respectively (mean follow‐up: 5.3 years). Patients with more surgeries (≥2/≥1/0) during follow‐up were more likely to be male (67.3%/69.0%/58.0%), have asthma (37.8%/28.2%/20.2%) and have baseline blood eosinophil counts ≥300 cells/μL (68.5%/66.0%/51.5%). During the first 90‐days post‐index as surgery number increased, the proportion of patients using oral corticosteroids (25.8%/20.7%/14.2%) and mean (SD) number of all‐cause healthcare visits (5.9 [4.2]/5.4 [4.0]/4.9 [4.2]) increased. Time between surgeries was shorter among patients with more surgeries. CRSwNP prevalence on 31 December 2018 was 476 cases per 100 000 persons. Conclusion A small proportion of patients in the UK required multiple surgeries for CRSwNP and this was associated with increasing comorbidity burden, baseline blood eosinophil counts, CRSwNP‐related treatment and HCRU use.