Cost Analysis of Cancer in Brazil: A Population-Based Study of Patients Treated by Public Health System From 2001-2015

Objectives: The aim of this study was to evaluate the federal government expenditures with oncological care, for the most incident cancer types among the Brazilian population, using registries of all patients treated by the Brazilian National Health Service (SUS) between 2001 and 2015. We adopted the formal healthcare sector perspective in this study, with the costs per patient estimated by the reimbursement price paid by the Ministry of Health to service providers. Methods: The costs were adjusted by the follow-up time for each patient. We performed multivariate regression analysis using ordinary least squares. We analyzed 952 960 patients aged >= 19 years who underwent cancer treatment, between 2001 and 2015, for breast, prostate, colorectal, cervix, lung, and stomach cancers. Results: The annual mean costs per patient (in USD purchasing power parity) was $9572.30, varying from $5782.10 for breast cancer to $16 656 for cervical cancer. Several variables predicted higher costs of cancer treatment, namely: to be male (+14%), with younger age ranges at treatment initiation, resident in the Northeast region (+26%), treated for colorectal cancer (+482%), with treatment initiation from 2010 to 2014, tumor stages III and IV (III: +182%; IV: +165%), hospitalization for other reasons besides the cancer treatment, and suffering from some a comorbidity. Conclusions: Given the forthcoming Brazilian demographic changes, which strongly suggest that the economic burden of cancer is about to increase in the near future, our estimates provide relevant information to produce useful projections about future cancer-related costs.