The Costs of the Diagnostic Process for Autism Spectrum Disorder in Thailand: A Multicenter Study

Global information on the costs of the autism spectrum disorder (ASD) diagnostic process is limited. No previous research has been conducted in Thailand. This study aimed to determine the societal costs of the ASD diagnostic process after the patients visited 7 tertiary hospitals in the Northern, Central, Northeast, and Southern regions of Thailand.

A total of 155 children diagnosed with ASD were included from January to December 2022. The societal costs consisted of the patient costs, and service provider costs. Government reimbursement and labor costs were also evaluated. The patient perspective costs were calculated from direct nonmedical costs plus nonreimbursable direct medical costs. Direct nonmedical costs were collected by parent questionnaires. Nonreimbursable direct medical costs and the government reimbursement were acquired from each hospital's financial database. Service provider perspective costs were gathered from the Human Resources Unit hospital database.

The median of societal, service provider, patient, labor costs, and government reimbursement for the ASD diagnostic process were 3578.6 (2433.7-5412.8), 259.5 (259.5-314.7), 3319.0 (2169.0-5138.1), 559.6 (488.8-795.6), and 200 (0-300) Thai Bahts (THB)/child, respectively. The caregiver productivity loss was the largest proportion among the total patient perspective costs. The median societal costs by region sorted by descending order were Northeast, Central, North, and South, which were 5197.6 (3248.5-6802.3), 3578.6 (2688.8-5412.8), 3028.6 (2286.7-4905.7), and 2198.9 (1686.8-3483.9) THB/child, respectively.

The societal costs of the ASD diagnostic process were 3578.6 THB/child. The Northeast region demonstrated the highest costs. The caregiver productivity loss was the largest proportion of the total societal costs.