[Cost analysis of thyroid gland surgery in a university surgical clinic]

On 1 January 1996, the implementation of the new recompense system, the Bundespflegesatzverordnung (BPflV), at the Medical University Halle replaced the former German hospital financing system based on clinic-dependent individual prices. This was the beginning of a new price-performance system of the German hospital market. Since then, for all surgical procedures (catalogue section 301 SGB V ICPM 5061-5064) for benign and malignant thyroid diseases a detailed cost analysis has been performed. Our personnel and material inputs were documented on-line in the operating theatre on a special designed cost-analysis record. The cost analysis was based on 14 cases of lobectomy (average operative costs DM 1886.82), and 20 each of bilateral subtotal thyroidectomy (average DM 1970.48), unilateral subtotal thyroidectomy with contralateral lobectomy (average DM 2164.26) and total thyroidectomy (average DM 2396.70) respectively. In 12 cases the costs of total thyroidectomy with cervical and transthoracal lymphadenectomy have been analyzed (average DM 4664.48).