Costs of cervical cancer and precancerous lesions treatment in a publicly financed health care system.
OBJECTIVE
Although cervical cancer is the most frequent cancer for women in Taiwan, no examination of its treatment costs has yet been undertaken. This study aimed to investigate the costs of cervical cancer and precancerous lesion treatment in Taiwan.


METHODS
A total of 7,398 cases of cervical intraepithelial neoplasia (CIN) lesions were identified from the Taiwan Cervical Cancer Screening Registration System in 2003. A further 1,469 cases of invasive cervical cancer (ICC) were also identified from a survey on cervical cancer staging information conducted by the Taiwan Cancer Registration Task Force. Resource usage covering the first 6 months after CIN diagnosis and the 5 years after ICC diagnosis were extracted from the National Health Insurance claims database. The duration of each visit and the transportation costs were collected by means of personal interviews with CIN/ICC patients. The mean and standard deviation of the treatment and indirect costs were estimated.


RESULTS
The average total costs for CIN patients were NT$4,201 for CIN1, NT$8,623 for CIN2 and NT$14,406 for CIN3, with the indirect costs accounting for 25-33% of the total. The total costs for ICC patients were NT$210,230 for Stage 1, NT$392,387 for Stage 2, NT$433,969 for Stage 3 and NT$464,701 for Stage 4, with the indirect costs accounting for about 14-17% of the total.


CONCLUSIONS
CIN and ICC treatment resulted in considerable costs to the healthcare system in Taiwan. Indirect costs associated with such treatment were also substantial and cannot be ignored.
Tang
Chao-Hsiun
CH
School of Health Care Administration, Taipei Medical University, No. 250 Wu Xing Street, Xing Yi District, Taipei 110, Taiwan. chtang@tmu.edu.tw
Pwu
Raoh-Fang
RF
Tsai
I-Ching
IC
Wang
Han-I
HI
You
San-Lin
SL
Chen
Chi-An
CA
Scuffham
Paul A
PA
Hsieh
Chang-Yao
CY
Chou
Cheng-Yang
CY
Lin
Sheue-Rong
SR
Chen
Yao-Der
YD
Chen
Chien-Jen
CJ
D000328:Adult; D005260:Female; D017048:Health Care Costs / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D006801:Humans; D008875:Middle Aged; D013624:Taiwan; D002583:Uterine Cervical Neoplasms / Q000191:economics* / Q000628:therapy; D002578:Uterine Cervical Dysplasia / Q000191:economics* / Q000628:therapy