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. 2019 Jun;20(Suppl 1):155-172.
doi: 10.1007/s10198-019-01066-x. Epub 2019 May 18.

Cost-of-illness studies in nine Central and Eastern European countries

Valentin Brodszky  1 , Zsuzsanna Beretzky  2   3 , Petra Baji  2 , Fanni Rencz  2   4 , Márta Péntek  2 , Alexandru Rotar  5 , Konstantin Tachkov  6 , Susanne Mayer  7 , Judit Simon  7   8 , Maciej Niewada  9 , Rok Hren  10   11 , László Gulácsi  2
Affiliations

Cost-of-illness studies in nine Central and Eastern European countries

Valentin Brodszky et al. Eur J Health Econ. 2019 Jun.

Abstract

Background: To date, a multi-country review evaluating the cost-of-illness (COI) studies from the Central and Eastern European (CEE) region has not yet been published. Our main objective was to provide a general description about published COI studies from CEE.

Methods: A systematic search was performed between 1 January 2006 and 1 June 2017 in Medline, EMBASE, The Cochrane Library, CINAHL, and Web of Science to identify all relevant COI studies from nine CEE countries. COI studies reporting costs without any restrictions by age, co-morbidities, or treatment were included. Methodology, publication standards, and cost results were analysed.

Results: We identified 58 studies providing 83 country-specific COI results: Austria (n = 9), Bulgaria (n = 16), Croatia (n = 3), the Czech Republic (n = 10), Hungary (n = 24), Poland (n = 11), Romania (n = 3), Slovakia (n = 3), and Slovenia (n = 4). Endocrine, nutritional, and metabolic diseases (18%), neoplasms (12%), infections (11%), and neurological disorders (11%) were the most frequently studied clinical areas, and multiple sclerosis was the most commonly studied disease. Overall, 57 (98%) of the studies explicitly stated the source of resource use data, 45 (78%) the study perspective, 34 (64%) the costing method, and 24 (58%) reported at least one unit costs. Regardless of methodological differences, a positive relationship was observed between costs of diseases and countries' per capita GDP.

Conclusions: Cost-of-illness studies varied considerably in terms of methodology, publication practice, and clinical areas. Due to these heterogeneities, transferability of the COI results is limited across Central and Eastern European countries.

Keywords: Austria; Bulgaria; Central and Eastern Europe; Cost-of-illness; Croatia; Disease burden; Hungary; Poland; Romania; Slovakia; Slovenia; The Czech Republic.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Distribution of COI studies by ICD classification. a Distribution of country-specific results across clinical areas defined by ICD groups (n = 83). b Distribution of studies between clinical areas defined by ICD groups (n = 58)
Fig. 2
Fig. 2
Total costs (euro 2017) and GDP per capita (2017): comparison of single-country and multi-country studies. a Single-country studies: each line represents one disease, and each dot represents one study and one country. b Multi-country studies: each line represents one study and one disease, and each dot represents one country
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