By Deena Beasley and Bill Berkrot
LOS ANGELES, Nov 4 (Reuters) – Angioplasty to clear blocked
arteries costs more at hospitals not equipped for emergency
heart surgery, according to a study presented on Sunday at the
American Heart Association scientific meeting.
Elective angioplasty is becoming increasingly common at
hospitals that do not conduct more complicated heart procedures.
During angioplasty, doctors insert a balloon-tipped catheter
into an artery and inflate a balloon to open the narrowed blood
vessel.
Researchers from Duke University Medical School in North
Carolina analyzed billing data from more than 18,000 patients
and found that the average cumulative medical costs were $23,991
in surgery-equipped hospitals, versus $25,460 in those without
surgical centers.
“Surprisingly, there was no difference in procedure cost,”
said Dr. Eric Eisenstein, lead author of the study and assistant
professor of medicine at Duke. “We did find a difference in
follow-up cost.”
The difference was due mainly to the fact that non-surgery
hospitals used intensive care units for post-angioplasty care,
as required by the study, and patients treated at these
hospitals were more likely to be readmitted nine months after
treatment.
“Rising costs of medical care make it very pertinent for us
to assess value,” said Dr. Mark Hlatky, director of the
cardiovascular outcomes research center at Stanford University.
Eisenstein said, “there is no guarantee that a community
hospital can provide angioplasty services at costs comparable
with those of major hospitals with on-site cardiac surgery.”
More than 1 million coronary artery opening procedures are
performed in the United States each year, according to the
American Heart Association.
(Reporting By Deena Beasley; Editing by Stacey Joyce)
