Health costs

It has been estimated that hundreds of billions of dollars per year is lost due to decreased workplace productivity and increased health costs that can be saved by maintaining good indoor air quality in commercial buildings. The financial benefits of improving lAQ can accrue from reducing costs for health care and sick leave, as well as the costs of performance decrements at work caused by illness or adverse health symptoms and of responding to occupant complaints and costs of LAQ investigations. 

From this analysis it is clear that in addition to their benefits, the use of pesticides in food production not only causes serious public health problems but also considerable damage to vital agricultural and natural ecosystems in the United States and world. A conservative estimate suggests that the environmental and social costs of pesticide use in the United States total about 4 billion each year. Worldwide the yearly environmental and public health costs are probably at least 100 billion. This is several times the 18 bllllon/yr spent on pesticides in the world. 

Differences exist in primary care between the patterns of prescribing fluoxetine, paroxetine or sertraline, which may influence cost outcomes. Sertraline-treated patients are more likely to have their dose increased (Sclar et al, 1995 Donoghue, 1998), and to drop out of treatment prematurely (Donoghue, 1998). The apparent need to titrate doses upwards with sertraline may require more involvement by the clinician and may delay response to treatment, with resultant increases in direct health costs (Sclar et al, 1995). However, these economic findings are retrospective, may suffer from selection bias, and being derived from HMO patients may not be generalizable to other populations confirmation in further studies is required. 

In the wider medicopolitical arena, the health cost of the anxiety disorders more than justifies pleas to accord their treatment greater prominence in health policy and research funding (Rupp et al, 1998). 

Diabetes continues to be a major cause of excessive morbidity, severe disability and premature death in Western populations. In developed countries, the cost of diabetes to society may be estimated to be as high as 5% of the total health costs, much of which relates to the chronic vascular complications of this disorder (Williams, 1991). The vascular lesion in diabetes consists of (1) microangiopathy, distinguished by thickening of capillary basement membranes resulting in increased vascular permeability, which is clinically manifested as diabetic retinopathy (Fig. 12.1a) and/or nephropathy (Fig. 12.1b), and (2) macroangiopathy (Fig. 12.2),... 

Muir T, Zegarac M (2001) Societal costs of exposure to toxic substances economic and health costs of four case studies that are candidates for environmental causation. Environ Health Perspect 109(Suppl 6) 885-903... 

In Chapter 9 we were introduced to another class of drugs - central nervous system (CNS) depressants. This class of drugs includes many that are used for their anxiety-reducing properties. Alcohol is the most widely used of our recreational depressants, and its use has immense health costs for society. Furthermore, alcohol, unlike most of the other recreational drugs we have encountered, is legal in most countries. It produces a clear pattern of intoxication, with equally clear dose-related deficits. Intoxication depends on a number of factors including personality and other... 

This book consists of a series of works that evaluate various aspects related to the public financing of pharmaceuticals. In all health systems with majority public funding, the financing of pharmaceuticals constitutes one of the key factors in reform policies and health cost containment measures. This importance of pharmaceutical spending can be explained by both its relative size (its share within health expenditure as a whole), and its rapid growth, which is closely related to the constant incorporation of therapeutic innovations. 

In the 1970s and 1980s in the USA, the need for health cost containment and the alarming empirical estimates on the extent of moral hazard advised an increase in the co-payment rate for health services. Thus, Feldstein5 estimated that if the co-insurance rate were raised from 33 per cent to 67 per cent, the costs incurred due to welfare loss would fall much more than the benefits derived from reducing the risk. Subsequently, Feldman and Dowd,6 using data from the Rand experiment in the 1980s, reached similar conclusions. 

Incorrect drug use occurs because essential information is not properly communicated -or is incompletely or incorrectly understood. Two results of not properly educating patients about their medicahons are mismedicahon and noncompliance, both of which cause unnecessary illness and health costs. Because patients usually interact more frequently with pharmacists than with their physicians, pharmacists are well positioned to monitor pahents for mismedicahon and noncompliance. Pharmacists can ensure that a pahent is taking their medication correctly and can help reduce unnecessary human suffering and increasing healthcare costs. 

Headden, Susan. Guns, Money and Medicine The Proliferation of Powerful New Weapons Has Sent the Cost of Crime Spiraling. Here s Why You Pay. U.S. News World Report, vol. 121, July 1, 1996, pp. 30ff. Analyzes the health costs caused by gun crime, using a variety of example cases. The costs are increasing due to the proliferation of more powerful weapons. All consumers end up paying more for these health costs because tax money must be used to care for the majority of victims, who are uninsured. 

The health costs of tobacco smoking to the smoker and its socioeconomic costs to the general public are still incompletely understood. However, the 1979 Surgeon General s Report on Health Promotion and Disease Prevention stated that... 

Often, before people die, it is necessary that they spend a considerable amount of time in the hospital with all of the attendant costs. Both alcohol and tobacco play significant roles in this regard. In fact, a series of lawsuits were generated in the 1990s by several states with this in mind. It is the states contention that tobacco companies should be held liable for health costs caused by their products, and they should be required to compensate the states for this expense (see Appendix). The city of San Francisco has also taken this position. 

Schizophrenia accounts for about 40% of mental health hospital beds and about 15% of all hospital beds. The costs to society are staggering 19 billion per year in the United States for direct costs (hospitalization, physician and therapist services, and medications) and 46 billion in indirect costs (disability, lost productivity, etc.). It accounts for 2.5% of all U.S. health costs and about 20% of the total days of Social Security benefits. 

Considered part of mental health costs another referral specialty. 

The most obvious impact of mycotoxins is the inability to sell crops for human or animal food due to contamination with even relatively low levels of certain mycotoxins. In certain developing countries where there is less regulation or monitoring of human and animal exposure to toxins, there are risks of higher human health costs and animal death. Additional losses can be from a number of unseen problems such as reduction in birth rate in certain animals, decline in milk production by dairy cattle and egg production in poultry, loss of... 

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