Breaking down the costs for breast cancer: Insights from Sweden's national quality register

With new emerging technologies for diagnostics and treatment for breast cancer, there is a demand for updated breast cancer costs based on current clinical practice. The objectives of this study were to estimate recent societal costs of breast cancer in Sweden and provide population-based patient-level cost estimates for health economic evaluations.

This prevalence-based cost-of-illness study was based on 2019 data linking multiple Swedish national registers. The analysis employed a societal perspective considering direct health care, informal care, and productivity losses. Total costs were estimated using a bottom-up micro-costing approach. Direct costs per patient-year were also estimated by subgroups, including age group, breast cancer subtype, breast cancer stage at diagnosis, and disease state defined by metastatic status.

82,960 breast cancer patients diagnosed since 2008 were alive by the end of 2019. The annual societal cost of breast cancer in Sweden was €632 million, where the direct health care, informal care, and productivity losses accounted for 37 %, 5 %, and 57 %, respectively. The cost per capita was €61. Costs of direct health care, including inpatient/outpatient care and prescribed drugs, varied by subgroups, where younger age, higher stage, and more adverse subtypes were associated with higher costs per patient-year. Patients with a diagnosis of de novo metastatic cancer incurred the highest mean cost per patient-year.

Breast cancer represents a large economic burden in Sweden. The mean cost estimates per patient-year are informative to future health economic evaluations for breast cancer screening and treatment.