A COST MEASUREMENT STUDY FOR A TELE-ONCOLOGY PRACTICE

The costs of providing oncology services in three different ways were measured. Services were provided to a peripheral hospital by: conventi onal clinics, in which the oncologist worked at the hospital concerned ; outreach clinics, in which an oncologist was flown in periodically f rom a central hospital; and telemedicine clinics, in which the oncolog ist at the central hospital practised via a video-link. During a one-y ear study period, 2400 patients were seen in conventional clinics, 81 in outreach clinics and 103 in telemedicine clinics. At these workload s the average costs per patient were $149, $897 and $812, respectively . However, the average costs cannot be compared directly without furth er information about the shape of the unit cost curves.