Related Experiment Video
Updated: Jun 26, 2026
Digital Home-Monitoring of Patients after Kidney Transplantation: The MACCS Platform
Published on: April 12, 2021
Preventing chronic disease: an important investment, but don't count on cost savings
1Institute for Health and Department of Economics, Rutgers University in New Brunswick, New Jersey, USA. lrussell@ifh.rutgers.edu
Insights
Preventive healthcare often increases medical costs, despite common belief. Strategic choices in intervention design can improve cost-effectiveness and potentially lead to savings.
Area of Science:
- Health economics
- Preventive medicine
- Medical decision-making
Background:
- Cost-effectiveness analysis (CEA) in health has a four-decade history.
- Numerous studies indicate preventive interventions typically increase, rather than decrease, overall medical expenditures.
- Examples include medications for hypertension and high cholesterol, lifestyle changes for diabetes prevention, and cancer screening/early treatment.
Purpose of the Study:
- To analyze the cost-effectiveness of preventive health interventions.
- To identify factors influencing the economic outcomes of preventive strategies.
Main Methods:
- Review of hundreds of cost-effectiveness studies in health and medicine over four decades.
- Analysis of specific preventive interventions such as pharmacotherapy, lifestyle modifications, and screening programs.
- Examination of variables like intervention frequency, target populations, and component costs.
Main Results:
- Preventive measures, including medications and lifestyle changes, generally incur higher costs than they save.
- Hypertension and cholesterol medications, diabetes prevention strategies, and cancer screening/treatment were found to add to costs.
- Optimization of intervention parameters (frequency, targeting, costs) can enhance cost-effectiveness.
Conclusions:
- Preventive healthcare interventions often represent an added cost rather than a cost saving.
- Careful planning and targeted application of preventive strategies are crucial for maximizing their economic value.
- While generally increasing costs, specific design choices can make interventions highly cost-effective or even cost-saving.
Abstract:
Over the four decades since cost-effectiveness analysis was first applied to health and medicine, hundreds of studies have shown that prevention usually adds to medical costs instead of reducing them. Medications for hypertension and elevated cholesterol, diet and exercise to prevent diabetes, and screening and early treatment for cancer all add more to medical costs than they save. Careful choices about frequency, groups to target, and component costs can increase the likelihood that interventions will be highly cost-effective or even cost-saving.
Related Concept Videos
01:30Preventive Healthcare Services
01:26Levels of Health Promotion and Illness Prevention
In primary prevention, actions taken before disease onset prevent the disease from...
01:20Lifestyle Factors and Health
Benefits of Physical Activity
Physical activity, whether through structured exercise or casual activities like walking, biking, or dancing, is a cornerstone of a...
01:26Stress Prevention and Stress Management Techniques IV
01:26Methods Of Healthcare Delivery System
Managed Care System:
The managed care system is designed to control the cost while maintaining the quality of care. The patient's care from admission to discharge is planned by the primary care provider or the case manager, also known as the gatekeeper. In a managed care system, the number of care providers is limited...
01:23Types of Biopharmaceutical Studies: Controlled and Non-Controlled Approaches
Non-controlled studies, commonly employed for initial exploration, lack a control group, rendering them susceptible to biases and external influences. In contrast, controlled...