22 December 2017, The Hague, The Netherlands – NightBalance, a leader in innovative obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) therapies, today announced that the Dutch National Health Care Institute (ZIN) issued a positive recommendation to include its sleep apnea therapy for reimbursement. The Dutch Ministry of Health, Welfare and Sport will formally approve inclusion of the SPT® following ZIN’s recommendation.
The approval is based on the company’s strong data, demonstrating clinical efficacy, which allowed NightBalance to successfully fulfill the high standards set by the reimbursement approval process in the Netherlands for new medical devices and therapeutics. The government’s decision allows health care insurers in the Netherlands to offer all Dutch citizens suffering from POSA the SPT® device as part of the basic insurance plan. POSA is a subset of OSA, the most common and potentially serious sleep disorder.
“We are delighted with ZIN’s recommendation that the decision by the Dutch Ministry of Health approve the reimbursement of our sleep apnea therapy, SPT®. This marks an important milestone for our company” said Eline Vrijland-van Beest, founder and CEO of NightBalance.
“This approval is the recognition of our ground-breaking work in building a solid clinical data set of more than 80,000 nights in peer reviewed published research, demonstrating the ease of use, efficacy, and cost-effectiveness of our therapy and the SPT® device. We thank the team of the ZIN institute for their cooperation and support in getting to this milestone and look forward to building on this achievement by accelerating access to the SPT® for POSA patients and clinicians in the Netherlands and other countries.”
“The inclusion of SPT® in the basic insurance plan is great news for all Dutch patients suffering from POSA,” said Prof. Dr. Nico De Vries, Ear, Nose & Throat Doctor at Onze Lieve Vrouwe Gasthuis (OLVG). “The user-friendly SPT® offers an excellent alternative to current treatments with more convenience and comfort for the patient and less cost for our system” .”