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Economic burden of long-term complications of deep vein thrombosis after total hip replacement surgery in the United States.

BACKGROUND: Estimates of the cost of long-term complications of a primary deep vein thrombosis (DVT), including the post-thrombotic syndrome (PTS) and recurrent venous thromboembolism (VTE), may be relevant for resource allocation decisions. OBJECTIVE: The objective of this study was to provide US cost estimates of the long-term complications of a primary DVT, which occurs in approximately 5% to 20% (with adequate thromboprophylaxis) and 50% (in the absence of thromboprophylaxis) of total hip replacement surgeries (THRS). METHODS: A literature-based model was used to project the excess long-term complication costs of DVT following THRS. The model simulated the natural history of DVT complications using published estimates of the incidence and prognosis of PTS and recurrent VTE. Each complication was assigned a cost obtained by multiplying the amount of resources used in its management by the unit price of these resources. RESULTS: The annual per-patient cost of each complication was as follows: mild-to-moderate PTS, 839 dollars in the first year and 341 dollars in subsequent years; severe PTS, 3817 dollars in the first year and 1677 dollars in subsequent years; DVT, 3798 dollars; and pulmonary embolism, 6604 dollars. The average discounted lifetime cost of DVT complications was estimated to be 3069 dollars (95% interval 2091 dollars-4279 dollars). CONCLUSIONS: The long-term complications of a primary DVT represent a significant economic burden. Preventing a DVT could arguably lead to substantial savings in long-term DVT complications.

Aged↗

Principles of good practice for decision analytic modeling in health-care evaluation: report of the ISPOR Task Force on Good Research Practices--Modeling Studies.

OBJECTIVES: Mathematical modeling is used widely in economic evaluations of pharmaceuticals and other health-care technologies. Users of models in government and the private sector need to be able to evaluate the quality of models according to scientific criteria of good practice. This report describes the consensus of a task force convened to provide modelers with guidelines for conducting and reporting modeling studies. METHODS: The task force was appointed with the advice and consent of the Board of Directors of ISPOR. Members were experienced developers or users of models, worked in academia and industry, and came from several countries in North America and Europe. The task force met on three occasions, conducted frequent correspondence and exchanges of drafts by electronic mail, and solicited comments on three drafts from a core group of external reviewers and more broadly from the membership of ISPOR. RESULTS: Criteria for assessing the quality of models fell into three areas: model structure, data used as inputs to models, and model validation. Several major themes cut across these areas. Models and their results should be represented as aids to decision making, not as statements of scientific fact; therefore, it is inappropriate to demand that models be validated prospectively before use. However, model assumptions regarding causal structure and parameter estimates should be continually assessed against data, and models should be revised accordingly. Structural assumptions and parameter estimates should be reported clearly and explicitly, and opportunities for users to appreciate the conditional relationship between inputs and outputs should be provided through sensitivity analyses. CONCLUSIONS: Model-based evaluations are a valuable resource for health-care decision makers. It is the responsibility of model developers to conduct modeling studies according to the best practicable standards of quality and to communicate results with adequate disclosure of assumptions and with the caveat that conclusions are conditional upon the assumptions and data on which the model is built.

Benchmarking↗

UK budgetary systems and new health-care technologies.

OBJECTIVES: This article outlines the budgetary setting within the UK health-care system. METHODS: It is argued that while prospective budgets can give rise to efficient resource allocation outcomes, this relies on the budget being set at an appropriate level and the accompanying incentive structures being efficient. The organizational structures and the interrelationships are critical. The recent history of UK National Health Service reforms and expenditure is outlined. It is suggested that until recently, although the budget system has the potential to promote efficiency, the aggregate budget allocated to the NHS has probably been too low given public expectations, technology advances, and preferences for health care. RESULTS: The aggregate budget is due to rise considerably over the next 5 years. While some incentive and regulatory provisions will move the budget toward an efficient allocation many microlevel incentive issues remain. CONCLUSION: Whether efficient patterns of health-care allocation emerge remains open to debate, however, because the existing incentive mechanisms are not optimal.

Biomedical Technology↗

Radiotherapy service delivery models for a dispersed patient population.

Access to health care interventions can be impeded when significant patient travel is required. In this economic evaluation we compare, from a societal perspective, three scenarios for the delivery of radiation treatment to an idealized population of 1,600 patients distributed between two urban nodes (1,200 + 400 patients each) separated by up to 500 km. As it is implicitly assumed that the clinical outcome for those patients who access the system is independent of the service delivery model, this study constitutes a cost minimization analysis from a societal perspective. The costs to the health care system are based on an activity costing model developed by us and consistent with recent Canadian studies. The costs to the patient are approximated by a formula that includes direct costs (travel and accommodation) and indirect (time) costs, with the latter based on a human capital approach. A sensitivity analysis has been performed to confirm the robustness of our conclusions both to uncertainties in the input data and to the inclusion of time costs, the estimation of which remains controversial. From a societal cost perspective only, we show that outreach radiotherapy (central comprehensive facility and satellite) is the economically superior service delivery model for separations between 30 km and 170 km. Beyond 170 km, a fully decentralized service would be warranted if the only consideration were societal economic advantage.

Community-Institutional Relations↗

An economic model to assess the cost and benefits of the routine use of silver alloy coated urinary catheters to reduce the risk of urinary tract infections in catheterized patients.

Prevalence studies generally find nosocomial urinary tract infections to be the most common type of nosocomial infection, accounting for between 21% and 45% of all HAIs. The main risk factor appears to be the presence of a urinary catheter, with an estimated 80% of these infections being associated with their use. This paper describes a model which quantifies the extent of the burden of these infections in terms of the number of patients affected and the costs incurred by the hospital sector; and identifies the potential benefits of the routine use of silver alloy coated catheters, as a means of reducing the incidence of this type of infection. An illustrative model of the annual costs and benefits associated with the routine use of this intervention in adult, non-day case patients admitted to the medical and surgical specialties of NHS hospitals throughout England is presented. The results suggest that a 14.6% reduction in the incidence of urinary tract infections in catheterized medical patients, and a 11.4% reduction in catheterized surgical patients, would cover the cost of the intervention. Any further reduction in incidence would result in net positive benefits.

Adult↗

An introduction to economic evaluation for pediatric surgeons.

In the last decade, the field of medicine has undergone irreversible changes in the relationship between the financing and delivery of health care. Because health care resources no longer can be treated as limitless, all providers are being forced to set priorities on services and are being held more accountable for quality of care. These changes have had a particular impact on surgical specialities. Because the discipline of economics is the study of the optimal allocation of scarce resources, it is not surprising that many of the methods of economic analysis now are being applied to outcomes research in surgery. Economic evaluation serves as the core methodology for the establishment of best practice guidelines through the growing field of evidenced-based medicine. The primary tools of economic evaluation include cost analysis, cost of illness analysis, cost-benefit analysis, cost-effectiveness analysis, and cost-utility analysis. This report provides an introduction of these methods to enable pediatric surgeons to understand and critically evaluate these investigations as applied in pediatric surgery.

Benchmarking↗

[Methods of comparative economic evaluations of therapies and for rational allocation of resources across sectors of health care systems - introduction, advantages, risks].

Because of scarcity of resources, diagnostic and therapeutic procedures in medicine increasingly have to be examined not only with regard to effectiveness but also with regard to cost-effectiveness, which means with regard to the relation between resources used and resulting outcome (however this outcome is measured). Primarily, this is true for treatment methods for one and the same medical condition. However, economists also consider to evaluate medical interventions across heterogeneous medical conditions, in order to rank them with regard to their cost-effectiveness. Using quality-adjusted life-years (QALYs) as outcome variable, all medical interventions examined can be ranked in QALY-League-Tables, which could serve as a basis for resource allocation decisions by health policy makers or other payers. However, there are methodological as well as ethical objections with such an approach.

Cost-Benefit Analysis↗

[Method determines results: indirect economic costs of alcohol abuse and alcoholism in Switzerland].

OBJECTIVE: The present contribution aims at illustrating the methodological problems that may arise from investigating the indirect social costs of alcohol consumption. METHODS: In order to estimate the alcohol-related productivity losses through excessive morbidity, regression analysis was performed, using data from the 2(nd) Swiss Health Survey (1997). For the purpose of sensitivity analysis two approaches were used (a) Rice and b) Harwood), and all models were calculated with and without smearing-adjustment as well as with and without adjustment for confounding variables. RESULTS: The present study shows that small changes in method may result in major variations in the estimated total costs. In monetary terms, the indirect costs for alcohol consumption in Switzerland through excess-morbidity were estimated at between 0.119 billion Francs (model Harwood, smearing-adjusted) and 2.175 billions Francs (model Rice, adjusted for confounding variables). CONCLUSION: Since many methodological problems in estimating the indirect costs of alcohol consumption have not been adequately resolved yet, results of those studies have to be interpreted with caution.

Alcohol-Related Disorders↗

[Smoking-attributable productivity loss in Germany--a partial sickness cost study based on the human capital potential method].

PURPOSE: Costs of productivity loss for the Federal Republic of Germany attributable to smoking in 1999 was to be determined. METHODS: Mortality and morbidity attributable to smoking is determined by a 0.5 % sample of the smoking behaviour of the German population (microcensus 1999) and the relative mortality risks of smokers (US-American cancer prevention study II). Tobacco smoke-associated cancer illnesses, cardiovascular diseases, respiratory tract diseases and illnesses of children under one year are considered. Calculation of the productivity-relevant consequences of smoking due to morbidity and mortality is effected according to the so-called human potential capital method. RESULTS: In Germany total of 607,393 working years were lost because of smoking in the year 1999. The costs of productivity loss are estimated at 14,480 billion euro. From this 4,525 billion euro are allotted to premature mortality, 5.759 billion euro to permanent disablement and 4.196 billion euro to temporary incapacitation for work. If the costs of productivity loss by smoking are referred to the gross national product (BSP) in the year 1999, an economical damage at a value of 0.74 % of BSPs results. This corresponds to a productivity loss of 379 euro per present or former smoker. The sensitivity analysis manifests that the inclusion of "non-marketable production" results in an immense rise productivity losses attributable to smoking. However, it should be noted that in times of mass unemployment the human capital method which is based on full employment does not measure the actual, but only the potential productivity loss cost. CONCLUSIONS: This partial disease cost study shows that immense economic productivity losses are associated with smoking. This loss of resources can justify a purposeful promotion of studies regarding cost effectiveness of anti-smoking therapeutic measures or preventive measures against smoking. But it should be considered that the use of the human potential capital method results in an overestimation of the actual productivity losses by smoking. In future the costs of productivity losses attributable to smoking should be determined by the friction cost method. With this procedure a more realistic estimation of productivity-relevant costs of smoking is possible.

Adult↗

[Cost-effectiveness of screening for amblyopia].

BACKGROUND: The effectiveness of a screening program for amblyopia has been discussed controversely for several years. While the medical profit is obvious, little is known on the cost-effectiveness of such a screening program. METHODS: By literature research all important variables were determined: incidence of amblyopia, sensitivity of different screening modalities, effectiveness of therapy, costs as well as the loss of utility and life quality by an existing amblyopia. Based on those data in a simple model the costs of a screening program for amblyopia were determined per quality adjusted life year (QALY). The result was analyzed for its stability by sensitivity analysis and compared to the costs of other therapies. RESULTS: Amblyopia occurs with an incidence of approximately 2 % (1.3 - 12 %). Most Screening programs reach a sensitivity of 60 - 90 % and cause costs of 900 - 1400 Euro per detected case. By appropriate therapy with mean costs of 2300 Euro approx. 60 % of the cases obtain useful vision of > 20/40. However, therapy results vary considerably. After discounting the incremental cost-effectiveness ratio (ICER) reaches 7684 Euro/QALY for a screening and treatment program for amblyopia. This is well comparable with other therapies and accepted to be cost-efficient. Sensitivity analysis yielded 24 700 Euro/QALY and 57,633 Euro/QAL with higher discounting for worst case scenarios. CONCLUSION: Screening for amblyopia meets the basic requirements of cost-effectiveness.

Amblyopia↗

[Teleradiology: economic research analysis of CT investigations in a small hospital].

PURPOSE: To evaluate, discuss and compare economic aspects of teleradiological applications in CT examinations in a small hospital. Scenario (1): CT examination by an extern institution including transport of a patient. Szenario (2): External consultation of an internal CT examination (teleradiology according to ROV). Scenario (3): Complete in-house radiology department. To evaluate economic aspects of teleradiology service providers. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Costs have been separated into fixed and variable costs in a model. Total costs of 500 CT examinations per year have been calculated for the three scenarios. A break-even analysis has been performed to determine the necessary/minimal number of CTs per year for economical advantages. The number of CT consultations for teleradiology service providers to make profit has been calculated. RESULTS: Scenario (1): This is the most cost-effective scenario for 500 CTs per year, but most time-consuming. Beyond 548 CTs per year using a single slice CT and 965 CTs per year using a multislice CT the teleradiology scenario [scenario (2)] is most cost-effective. Beyond 1065 CTs per year an in-house radiology department [scenario (3)] is economically reasonable. On the basis of 30 Euros per CT consultation a teleradiology service providing system will be profitable starting from 322 CT consultations per year. CONCLUSION: Teleradiology applications are economically reasonable in a wide range in small hospitals. CT teleradiology services can also be provided on a cost-effective basis at a reachable number of consultations.

Cost-Benefit Analysis↗

[Further development of the diagnosis-related groups system--fact or fiction? Differentiation of case severities in patients with proximal femoral fractures 2003-2005].

BACKGROUND: The previous system of hospital financing based on the returns (consisting of payments received minus cost of patient treatment) is undergoing considerable changes on the basis of learning to apply the new Diagnosis-Related Groups (G-DRG) system which differentiates the financial returns according to the individual severity of each case. AIM OF THE STUDY: 1. What are the differences in cost and returns when applying the G-DRG systems 2003, 2004 and 2005 to well-defined groups of patients (for example, surgery of proximal femoral fractures)? 2. The influence exercised by secondary (supplementary) diagnosis on the grouping of the patients. 3. Has the G-DRG system been appropriately developed further in respect of improved differentiation according to severity of the cases and homogenisation of the patient groups? PATIENTS AND METHODS: The study was based on comprehensive clinical data of 169 proximal femur fracture patients. We assessed the Case-Mix index, relative weights and returns, basic DRG, DRG, the number and weight of secondary diagnoses relevant for complexity and comorbidity levels (CCL), the summands of the CCL's and the resulting PCCL values (Patient Clinical Complexity Levels). The data were subjected to analysis of variance and graphically descriptive analysis. RESULTS: The effective Case Mix index decreases in the 2004 and 2005 systems compared to 2003. This is due to a significant drop in returns based on an unchanged rate of receipts of 3000 . The progressive development of the systems was partly associated with major changes in grouping without significant intra-group homogenisation or improved inter-group discrimination of indications. The differentiation process does not fully utilise the differentiation potential of the basic data. CONCLUSIONS: No definite improvement of the differentiation potential of the G-DRG systems seems to have been achieved by the 2004 and 2005 systems compared to 2003 using the data of the relevant group of patients with proximal femoral fractures. From 2005 onward the financial lumpsum receipts and returns will definitely affect hospital budgets. Hence, a substantial improvement of the the basis of calculation is imperative for 2005 as well as complete publication of the relevant data. It is indeed doubtful whether the extension of the convergence phase to 5 years presently under discussion would provide sufficient time for an adequate solution of the financial and system problems.

Aged↗

Potential effects of managed care on specialty practice at a university medical center.

BACKGROUND: The growth of managed care presents a challenge to academic medical centers, because the demand for the services of specialists is likely to continue decreasing. We estimated the number of enrollees the University of Michigan Medical Center would need in its health maintenance organization (HMO) system in order to provide revenue equivalent to the total revenue it received for professional specialty care in 1992. METHODS: Rates of utilization and payment were based on the medical center's experience with managed care in 1992 in its independent practice association HMO, in which 25,000 members had capitated coverage and received primary and all specialty care from university physicians, and 15,000 members received primary care and most specialty care from physicians outside the university. We assumed that persons not enrolled in Medicare were all enrolled in managed-care plans. Primary care activity was excluded from the calculations of expense, revenue, and numbers of faculty members. RESULTS: If all specialty services were provided by the university to HMO members, all the 21 specialties examined except obstetrics and gynecology and emergency services would require an enrollment of more than 250,000 to support the 1992 level of professional revenue and maintain the number of faculty members. If university services were provided only for referrals from a loosely affiliated network of community physicians in the HMO system, all the 19 specialties examined except plastic surgery would require an HMO enrollment of more than 1 million. In a combined model in which all specialty services were provided to 100,000 HMO members and network referrals were provided to 500,000 members, substantial changes in faculty composition would be needed in all the departments studied. CONCLUSIONS: Because of the large number of HMO members required, unless other changes occur, it is unrealistic to expect that the University of Michigan Medical Center could create an HMO or network large enough to support the specialty practice of the current number of faculty members at the 1992 level of financing.

Academic Medical Centers↗