Cost of illness of epilepsy per patient per year in a tertiary care hospital in New Delhi: A Prospective Observational study

Abstract

Background: Epilepsy is a disorder of the brain characterized by an enduring predisposition to generate epileptic seizures that imposes heavy burden on individuals, families, and also on healthcare systems. As the better understanding of economic aspects of epilepsy will lead to better development of epilepsy care this study was conducted to estimate the cost of illness in epilepsy per patient per year in a tertiary care hospital in New Delhi.

Aims and Objectives: The aim of study was to study the direct, indirect and total cost of illness in epilepsy per patient per year in a tertiary care hospital.

Materials and Methods: Patients with epilepsy attending the Department of Neurology at Batra Hospital and Medical Research Centre in New Delhi were included in this study. All epilepsy patients fulfilling the inclusion and exclusion criteria were included in the study. The cost of illness was estimated as total, direct and indirect costs of illness per year for each patient. The information was collected on a properly formed format which consists of the demographic details of the patient, general biodata of patient, information about the direct medical costs and direct non-medical costs and information about indirect costs. The results are presented in Mean ± SD frequencies and percentages. The Kruskal-Wallis test was used to compare the costs of illness among different strata. The Mann-Whitney U test was used to compare the costs of illness between strata. The p-value<0.05 was considered significant. All the analysis was carried out on SPSS 16.0 version (Chicago, Inc., USA).

Results: A total of 70 patients were included in the study. The median age of patients was 28.50 years and the mean age was 33.36 years. The total indirect and direct cost of illness was Rs. 5265.30±6363.42 and Rs. 25249.38±14480.09 respectively. The total cost of illness was Rs. 26808.42±16108.05. The highest mean cost was for Carbamazepine (Rs. 14500.00), followed by Levetiracetam (Rs.13300.00) and rest by the other commonly used drugs.

Conclusion: We concluded that economic burden of epilepsy on the family and patients can be decreased by decreasing the hospitalization rates of patients, avoiding poly therapy as much as possible and rationalizing the investigations.