Measuring economic consequences of preterm birth - methodological recommendations for the evaluation of personal burden on children and their caregivers
Creators: name: Hodek, Jan-Marc
name: Schulenburg, Johann-Matthias Graf Von Der
name: Mittendorf, Thomas
Publisher: name: Heidelberg : Springer Verlag
Year: 2011
Subjects: subject: Burden of disease
subject: Emotional distress
subject: Low birth weight
subject: Out-of-pocket expenditures
subject: Parents
subject: Preterm birth
subject: Quality of life
subject: absenteeism
subject: caregiver burden
subject: clinical assessment
subject: direct medical cost
subject: direct non medical cost
subject: economic aspect
subject: economic evaluation
subject: emotional stress
subject: financial burden
subject: gestational age
subject: health care cost
subject: health insurance
subject: health status
subject: hospital readmission
subject: human
subject: income
subject: indirect cost
subject: infant
subject: intangible cost
subject: low birth weight
subject: newborn period
subject: out of pocket expenditure
subject: outpatient care
subject: premature labor
subject: prematurity
subject: priority journal
subject: puerperal depression
subject: quality of life
subject: questionnaire
subject: review
subject: special education
subject: traffic and transport
subject: travel
subject: Dewey Decimal Classification::300 | Sozialwissenschaften, Soziologie, Anthropologie::330 | Wirtschaft
subject: Dewey Decimal Classification::600 | Technik::610 | Medizin, Gesundheit

description: This study aims to identify the impact of a preterm birth on financial and emotional burden from the families' perspective. Additionally, a comprehensive schedule of recommendations for a sufficient evaluation of all aspects of burden is developed. Based on the results of a literature search relevant categories and sub-domains for a questionnaire covering multiple aspects of associated financial and emotional burden are identified and converted into a recommendation scheme. Results of the literature search illustrate the large extend of burden of prematurity on parents. This results in substantial out-of-pocket expenditures (OOPE) and emotional distress to the parents besides the medical problems and further financial costs to the health insurance system. According to the results on infants' state of health, OOPE and emotional distress are significantly increased with decreasing gestational age. OOPE for transportation often amounts to the main parental cost dimension. Moreover there is some evidence for a high magnitude of reduced income and missed work days. The family perspective has to be taken into account when calculating the overall costs of preterm births from a societal point of view. However, in recent years economic evaluations were performed rather inhomogeneously in this field. For future studies a) direct medical costs, b) direct non-medical costs, c) indirect costs as well as d) intangible costs (in terms of emotional distress and reduced quality of life for caregivers and children) are the main categories that should be evaluated measuring personal burden of preterm birth on families adequately. A detailed list of specific sub-domains is given. Additionally, the recommendations are not restricted to application in infants born preterm and/or at low birth weight.