[Community-based study on disease burden of diarrhea in Zhejiang province]

To study the status on economic burden of diarrhea in Zhejiang province so as to provide evidence for allocation of health resource as well as decision-making on health issues.

Multi-phases stratified random cluster sampling was used to select samples in the population. Data was collected on the incidence of diarrhea in the last two weeks as well as on the related cost due to medical care etc.

The overall incidence (person per year) of diarrhea was 0.26, with 0.29 in the rural and 0.22 in the urban areas respectively. The incidence of diarrhea in children less than 5 was 0.66 (person per year), higher than in any of the age groups. The average direct cost of medical treatment was 69.23 Yuan with average direct cost of non-medical care was 8.29 Yuan for every person, while the indirect cost was 48.43 Yuan. In conclusion, the average disease burden of diarrhea in the province was 1.697 billion Yuan per year, which accounted for 1 per thousand of the GDP, with 1.217 billion Yuan in rural area and 0.480 billion Yuan in the urban areas respectively. The direct cost of medical care was 0.886 billion Yuan (52.21%) and the direct cost due to non-medical care was 0.124 billion Yuan (7.31%). The indirect cost appeared to be 0.480 billion Yuan (40.48%). Factors that affecting the cost would relate to: severity of diarrhea, medical insurance, location of residential area, age and education background of the patients, etc.

Programs on diarrhea prevention and control should be strengthened to reduce the economic burden caused by this disease while special attention should be paid to those children who are under 5 years of age and living in the rural areas.