Journal Article

Quality of Life and Costs in Parkinson's Disease: A Cross Sectional Study in Hungary

Tamás, Gertrúd, Baji, Petra, Brodszky, Valentin, Gulácsi, László, Takáts, Annamária, Bereczki, Dániel, Péntek, Márta

2014

Overview

Patient reported outcomes and costs of illness are useful to capture some of the multiple effects of a disease and its treatments. Our aim was to assess quality of life (QoL) and costs of Parkinson's disease (PD) in Hungary, and to analyze their associations. A cross-sectional questionnaire survey was conducted in one neurology university clinic. Clinical characteristics, PD related resource utilizations and productivity loss in the past 12 months were recorded; the Hoehn&Yahr (HY) scale, PDQ-39 and EQ-5D questionnaires were applied. Cost calculation was performed from the societal perspective. 110 patients (34.5% female) were involved with mean age of 63.3 (SD=11.3) and disease duration of 8.2 (SD=5.8) years. PDQ-39 summary score was 48.1 (SD=13.4). The average EQ-5D score was 0.59 (SD=0.28), and was significantly lower than the population norm in age-groups 45-74. The correlation was significant between EQ-5D and PDQ-39 (-0.47, p=0.000), the HY scale and EQ-5D (-0.3416, p=0.0008) and PDQ-39 (0.3419, p=0.0006) scores. The total mean cost was €6030.2 (SD=6163.0)/patient/year (direct medical 35.7%, direct non-medical 29.4%, indirect cost 34.9%). A one year increase in disease duration and 0.1 decrease of the EQ-5D utility score increase the yearly costs by 8 to 10%, and 7.8%, respectively. The effect of the PDQ-39 score on total cost was not significant. Disease severity and public health importance of PD are clearly demonstrated by the magnitude of QoL loss. PD-related costs are substantial, but are much lower in Hungary than in Western European countries. Disease duration and EQ-5D score are significant proxy of costs.

• Publisher: Public Library of Science,Public Library of Science (PLoS)
• Subject: Age / Consent / Cost analysis / Cost of Illness / Costs / Cross-Sectional Studies / Female / Health Care Costs - statistics & numerical data / Health economics / Health Status / Humans / Hungary - epidemiology / Illnesses / Male / Medical treatment / Medicine and Health Sciences / Middle Aged / Movement disorders / Neurodegenerative diseases / Neurology / Parkinson Disease - economics / Parkinson Disease - epidemiology / Parkinson's disease / Patient Acceptance of Health Care - statistics & numerical data / Patients / Population / Public health / Quality assessment / Quality of Life / Questionnaires / Social Sciences / Studies / Surveys and Questionnaires / Tariffs