MEDICAL COSTS AND ECONOMIC PRODUCTION LOSSES DUE TO INJURIES IN THE NETHERLANDS

Background: To support injury control, we assessed the direct medical costs and indirect costs of injuries in the Netherlands, making use of recent advances in health economics. Methods: We estimated the direct medical costs with the help of available data on health care utilizat ion as a consequence of injuries, In our calculations of indirect cost s, we used two alternative approaches, We used the traditional human-c apital approach, which estimates the potential economic production los ses caused by diseases or injuries, In addition, we applied the fricti on-costs method, which was recently developed as an attempt to measure the actual economic production losses to society. Results: Injuries a re an important source of medical costs and economic production losses . Almost two-thirds of the medical costs are the result of injuries am ong females (mainly domestic injuries of elderly women). On the contra ry, independent of the method used, more than 80% of the indirect cost s are the result of injuries among males (mainly caused by a high freq uency of traffic injuries, occupational injuries, and sports injuries among young males), The application of the friction-costs method confi rms the importance of injuries as a source of production losses in com parison with other diseases, showing that they belong to the main thre e causes of indirect costs to society. Conclusions: Estimates of the m edical costs and both the potential and actual economic production los ses to society clearly demonstrate that injuries should be a major con cern for health policy makers and the medical profession.