COSTS OF TRIPLET PREGNANCY

OBJECTIVE: Our purpose was to describe the total costs involved in the delivery, prenatal, and neonatal care for triplet pregnancies. STUDY DESIGN: Twenty triplet pregnancies were born at our institution over t he 1-year period between July 1, 1992, and June 30, 1993. Total charge s for prenatal care, physician fees, antepartum admissions, delivery, postpartum inpatient and outpatient care, and neonatal inpatient and o utpatient care were extracted from the hospital billing computers. RES ULTS: Our 20 triplet pregnancies were delivered of 54 live born infant s at an average gestation of 30.2 weeks. Mothers averaged 16.7 inpatie nt hospital days. Total cost of prenatal care, outpatient laboratories and ultrasonography, delivery, and maternal inpatient care averaged $ 27,491. Neonates averaged 13.7 hospital days. Total neonatal costs for the inpatient stay and short term-postpartum (<6 week) outpatient per iod was $36,856 per family. Total average cost per family was $64,347. CONCLUSION: Combined maternal and neonatal costs per individual baby delivered was approximately $21,000. Although expensive, this cost is far from prohibitive, even in times of close attention to health care expenditures.