THE DILEMMA OF PROSTATE-CANCER - A GROWING HUMAN AND ECONOMIC BURDEN IRRESPECTIVE OF TREATMENT STRATEGIES

All prostate cancer patients (719 patients) within a specified populat ion were studied in order to assess both the overall economic burden o f this disease to the health-care economy and its burden to the indivi dual patient. The economic burden was estimated as the total lifetime expense (1995 prices) of all palliative hospital treatment. The expens es associated with prostate cancer therapy averaged USS 19 755 per per son. By extrapolation, palliative therapy for this disease currently c onsumes almost 1% of the entire Danish health-care budget. A total of 62% of the patients died from the disease. During hospitalization thes e patients on average required three times as much hospital care as ot her patients and about one-third needed regular treatment with opiates or equivalent drugs. Under the present circumstances we cannot recomm end an aggressive strategy towards localized prostate cancer even thou gh the incidence of this disease is increasing at an alarming speed an d its economic and human costs are excessive.