Estimating cancer costs sounds dull, but it is surprisingly useful. Measuring costs of care can inform:
- i) estimates of societal burden of disease, to complement health burden estimates
- ii) provide key data for cost effectiveness estimates for cancer treatment and prevention
- iii) represent understudied cancer system performance metrics
- iv) measure patient-borne burden of illness
Professor Murray Krahn MD MSc is Director of THETA (Toronto Health Economics and Technology Assessment Collaborative). He is also director of Division of Support Systems and Outcomes, Toronto General Hospital Research Institute, University of Toronto, Toronto.
Toronto is the province capital of Ontario which has a health care system similar to the Norwegian one. THETA is providing Ontario health authorities with effectiveness and cost-effectiveness data for priority setting in the province. Dr Krahn will happily take questions about cancer costs as well as about priority setting issues.