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Substance abuse treatment cost offsets vary with gender, age, and abstinence likelihood
W H Zywiak1, N G Hoffmann, R L Stout
1Department of Psychiatry and Human Behavior, Brown University, Providence, RI, USA.
Journal of Health Care Finance
|September 25, 1999
Abstract:
The cost-offset effect has been promoted as a way for substance abuse treatment to pay for itself by generating reductions in health care utilization in other areas. Clients (n = 5,434) that were abstinent for 24 months following substance abuse treatment had lower posttreatment utilization than clients that had relapsed. An examination of cost offsets revealed a complex interplay between gender, age, and type of utilization (medical versus psychiatric). Cost offsets were especially pronounced for women over 40 years old.