A cost-effectiveness analysis of routine pretreatment investigation for staging in cervical cancer patients.

ABSTRACT

Two methods of analysing the cost-effectiveness of routine pretreatment investigation of 524 cervical cancer patients were studied. It seems to be cost-effective to perform the complete pretreatment investigation only in patients at clinical stage III, while in initial stage I and II patients, only chest X-ray and IVP should be performed. This will be more significant if most of the patients are in an early stage and the hospital costs are higher, as well as the very high professional fees for private consultations especially in the developed countries. Following this suggestion, the direct and indirect cost to the patients and their relatives will be reduced without compromising the treatment of cervical cancer.