Assessing the cost of cystic fibrosis diagnosis and treatment.

OBJECTIVES

To extend previous evaluations of costs of cystic fibrosis (CF) diagnosis and examine key issues in assessing the CF cost of care.

STUDY

DESIGN

Costs for CF newborn screening (NBS) including CF multi-mutation testing are analyzed by using data from the Wisconsin State Laboratory of Hygiene. Electronic data from 2 Wisconsin CF centers are used to illustrate the complexity of analyzing CF health care utilization and costs.

RESULTS

The current cost-per-newborn of a CF multi-mutation test is 50% higher than testing for a single mutation. Data collection for the cost-of-care study requires a combination of electronic and manual data collection; modeling of cost data requires consideration of any censoring. Hospitalizations are shown to have a large impact on costs and show high variability at the individual level. Sixty-nine percent of children with meconium ileus had some hospitalization versus 56% of children without meconium ileus.

CONCLUSION

A cost-benefit analysis of CF multi-mutation testing is warranted. The study of health care cost data is complex and utilization varies between children. Individual-level modeling of CF costs must include factors contributing to the severity of the disease and allow for consideration of individual-level utilization, such as the number of hospitalizations.