title: Medical costs of Alzheimer's disease misdiagnosis among US Medicare beneficiaries.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Recent developments in diagnostic technology can support earlier, more accurate diagnosis of non-Alzheimer's disease (AD) dementias.
  
  
  METHODS
  To evaluate potential economic benefits of early rule-out of AD, annual medical resource use and costs for Medicare beneficiaries potentially misdiagnosed with AD prior to their diagnosis of vascular dementia (VD) or Parkinson's disease (PD) were compared with that of similar patients never diagnosed with AD.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Patients with prior AD diagnosis used substantially more medical services every year until their VD/PD diagnosis, resulting in incremental annual medical costs of approximately $9,500-$14,000. However, following their corrected diagnosis, medical costs converged with those of patients never diagnosed with AD.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The observed correlation between timing of correct diagnosis and subsequent reversal in excess costs is strongly suggestive of the role of misdiagnosis of AD - rather than AD comorbidity - in this patient population. Our findings suggest potential benefits from earlier, accurate diagnosis.
authors.affiliation: Eli Lilly and Company, Lilly Corporate Center, Indianapolis, IN, USA.
authors.forename: Craig A
authors.initials: CA
authors.lastname: Hunter
authors.affiliation: Analysis Group, Inc., Boston, MA, USA. Electronic address: noam.kirson@analysisgroup.com.
authors.forename: Noam Y
authors.initials: NY
authors.lastname: Kirson
authors.affiliation: Analysis Group, Inc., Boston, MA, USA.
authors.forename: Urvi
authors.initials: U
authors.lastname: Desai
authors.affiliation: Analysis Group, Inc., Boston, MA, USA.
authors.forename: Alice Kate G
authors.initials: AK
authors.lastname: Cummings
authors.affiliation: Eli Lilly and Company, Lilly Corporate Center, Indianapolis, IN, USA.
authors.forename: Douglas E
authors.initials: DE
authors.lastname: Faries
authors.affiliation: Analysis Group, Inc., Boston, MA, USA.
authors.forename: Howard G
authors.initials: HG
authors.lastname: Birnbaum
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D000544:Alzheimer Disease / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000191:economics*; D015331:Cohort Studies; D015140:Dementia, Vascular / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000191:economics; D003951:Diagnostic Errors / Q000191:economics*; D005260:Female; D017048:Health Care Costs; D006801:Humans; D016015:Logistic Models; D008297:Male; D006278:Medicare / Q000191:economics*; D017063:Outcome Assessment, Health Care / Q000191:economics; D012680:Sensitivity and Specificity; D014481:United States
keywords: Alzheimer's disease; Economic impact; Medicare; Misdiagnosis; Parkinson's disease; Vascular dementia