Hello enigmatic-ga,
The medical literature does indeed contain reported evidence of the
economic benefits of the use of clinical guidelines. A prime example
is from researchers at the Department of Pediatrics, New York
Presbyterian-Hospital and Joan and Sanford Weill Medical College and
Cornell University both in New York, who conducted a retrospective,
nonrandomized, controlled trial testing the effect of a clinical
pathway in pediatric asthma on hospital costs and length of stay. They
found that length of stay decreased from 4.2 days to 2.7 days, and the
annual total charges for pediatric asthma admissions decreased from 2
million dollars to 1.4 million dollars. Nursing and laboratory costs
also showed a statistically significant decrease.
A reference their work is
Wazeka A. Valacer DJ. Cooper M. Caplan DW. DiMaio M. Impact of a
pediatric asthma clinical pathway on hospital cost and length of stay.
Pediatric Pulmonology 2001.
The e-mail address of the corresponding author is:
awazeka@hotmail.com.
Further sources that you may find useful are:
Wallace JF. Weingarten SR. Chiou CF. Henning JM. Hohlbauch AA.
Richards MS. Herzog NS. Lewensztain LS. Ofman JJ. The limited
incorporation of economic analyses in clinical practice guidelines.
Journal of General Internal Medicine 2002. 17(3):210-20. {This is a
review article with many further relevant references.]
Eichner HL. Controlling costs and improving diabetes care.2002 Case
Manager. 13(2):75-7.
Mason J. Freemantle N. Nazareth I. Eccles M. Haines A. Drummond
M. When is it cost-effective to change the behavior of health
professionals? JAMA 2001. 286(23):2988-92.
Eccles M. Mason J. How to develop cost-conscious guidelines.
Health Technology Assessment 2001. 5(16):1-69.
Piecoro LT. Potoski M. Talbert JC. Doherty DE. Asthma prevalence,
cost, and adherence with expert guidelines on the utilization of
health care services and costs in a state Medicaid population. Health
Services Research 2001. 36(2):357-71.
Search terms in Medline: Clinical Practices Guidelines, Health Care
Costs, Length of Stay.
I hope this is the information you need. Please do not hesitate to ask
for further clarification or details.
Best regards,
vitalmed-ga |
