[Costs of diagnosis in emergency room consultations]

The costs for diagnostic workup in the medical emergency room were analyzed for 1000 consecutive patients in the course of a cost analysis program. Next to demographic data, the complaints leading to admission, all diagnostic procedures and tests as well as the final diagnosis were recorded. According to cumulated tariffs of individual services, the total cost for the 1000 patients amounted to Sfr. 303000. Medical, laboratory and technical services each amounted to one third of this sum. The cost of Sfr. 303 per patient compared rather well with those of Sfr. 350 for the average initial consultation at the outpatient clinic. The three symptoms thoracic or abdominal pain and headache covered 50% of the reasons for admission. The five most common diagnoses were: common cold, chest wall tenderness, gastroenteritis, headache and acute upper respiratory tract infection. The most cost-intensive workup was performed for nausea and vomiting and abdominal or thoracic pain. Technical procedures such as chest films and upper panendoscopy were responsible for high costs. Assessment of costs according to symptoms and final diagnosis, respectively, yielded almost identical results. In both cases, minimal and maximal costs varied by a factor of 20 or more.