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Vol.39 No.3 contents | Japanese/English |
- Original Article -
Cost Effectiveness of the Diagnosis and Treatment of Lung Cancer -Significance of Mass Surveys for Lung Cancer-
Hiroaki Nakamura and Atsushi SaitohFirst Department of Internal Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, University of the Ryukyus
Because of the changes in the medical environment, including reduction in the medical budget, and the problem of informed consent in the diagnosis and treatment of patients with lung cancer, how the allocated amount is spent for diagnosis and treatment is extremely important against such a background, we investigated the economic effect on the diagnosis and treatment of lung cancer. We studied 29 cases of lung cancer admitted in our hospital between January 1991 and November 1997. Of them, 14 cases were treated with chemotherapy and the other 15 cases were treated with best supportive care (BSC). We estimated the total cost in relation to overall hospitalization, mean survival time, and the cost required to survive for one day, and compared these variables, with operative cases (p-stage I) treated in the same period as the control group. Most patients in the control group were detected by mass surveys. The control group required significantly lower costs compared to the chemotherapy and BSC groups in relation to all of the above variables. These results suggest that mass surveys for lung cancer might be promising from the viewpoint of cost effectiveness.
key words: Mass survey for lung cancer, Cost effectiveness, p-stage I lung cancer
Received: April 13, 1998
Accepted: March 17, 1999
JJLC 39 (3): 251-260, 1999
