A cost measurement study for a tele-oncology practice.
The costs of providing oncology services in three different ways were measured. Services were provided to a peripheral hospital by: conventional clinics, in which the oncologist worked at the hospital concerned; outreach clinics, in which an oncologist was flown in periodically from a central hospital; telemedicine clinics, in which the oncologist at the central hospital practised via a video-link. During a one-year study period, 2400 patients were seen in conventional clinics, 81 in outreach clinics and 103 in telemedicine clinics. At these workloads the average costs per patient were $149, $897 and $812, respectively. However, the average costs cannot be compared directly without further information about the shape of the unit cost curves.
Doolittle
G C
GC
Division of Clinical Oncology, University of Kansas Medical Center, Kansas City 66160-7353, USA. GDoolitt@kumc.edu
Williams
A
A
Harmon
A
A
Allen
A
A
Boysen
C D
CD
Wittman
C
C
Mair
F
F
Carlson
E
E
D003362:Cost-Benefit Analysis; D017048:Health Care Costs; D006801:Humans; D016522:Oncology Service, Hospital / Q000191:economics*; D017216:Telemedicine / Q000191:economics*