Background: The purpose of this study was to determine to what extent methods used to assess health cost affect the total cost of a therapeutic procedure.
Method: We assessed total cost of 160 consecutive therapeutic intensification procedures using autologous blood progenitor cell transplantation, 95 for lymphoma and 65 for breast tumor.
Results: The average total cost of the therapeutic intensification for patients with lymphoma was 227156 francs (34630 euros), including 60720 francs (9257 euros) for mobilization, 14947 francs (22402 euros) for the treatment period and 19489 francs (2971 euros) for secondary hospitalization. The average total cost for patients with a breast tumor was 199626 francs (30433 euros), including 39269 francs (5987 euros) for mobilization, 14912 francs (22737 euros) for the treatment period, and 11215 francs (1709 euros) for secondary hospitalization.
Conclusion: We compared our findings with those from six earlier French studies. Differences in the methodologies used focuses attention on the need for incentives for better harmonization of health cost assessment.