Costs for high-risk pediatric and adolescent patients with acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) may be higher than standard-risk patients with the disease, according to a recent study.
While data regarding health care costs for young people with ALL is limited, studies have reported that hospitalizations associated with the condition can cost 5 times as much as hospitalizations for other pediatric diseases. A study published in Cancer Medicine was done to examine how costs for treating ALL have risen among pediatric, adolescent, and young adult patients. All patients observed for the study were between 1 and 26 years of age and received treatment for ALL between 1998 and 2012 according to Children’s Oncology Group protocols at the time.
Results of the study showed that the average per-patient hospitalization costs rose from $24,197 in 1998 to almost $38,000 in 2012, with an annual average growth rate (AAGR) of 6.1%. Some notable areas of growth included average room and care costs ($8646 to $15,849; AAGR, 13%), pharmacy costs ($2790 to $7510; AAGR, 13%), therapy costs ($9132 to 10271; AAGR, 4.8%), and diagnostic costs ($3629 to $4295; AAGR, 3.5%).
Subsequent analysis also showed that average costs for high-risk patients increased at a much higher rate than for standard-risk patients (AAGR, 14.2% vs 4.4%). Compared with standard-risk patients, high-risk patients also had more cost growth for hospital stays (AAGR, 16.5% vs 5.2) and admissions (10% vs 2.2%). In all, researchers determined that the health care costs for high-risk patients with ALL were 47% higher per period than for standard-risk patients.
Lead author Anne C. Kirchoff, PhD, MPH, University of Utah (Salt Lake City, UT), and her colleagues concluded that value-based interventions should be evaluated in an effort to reduce the cost burden associated with ALL. Additionally, future studies that include outpatient and indirect cost data should be done to better identify the total costs for all types of pediatric cancer.
