Custo-utilidade do tratamento cirúrgico da fratura do fêmur proximal em idosos, com foco no tempo entre o trauma e o tratamento

Abstract

The demographic transition causes the increase of chronic degenerative diseases, including osteoporosis. This disease is characterized by decreased bone strength and subsequent fractures. Among these, the hip fracture, the name given to the proximal femoral fractures in the elderly, is the most devastating. High mortality and morbidity, as well as high costs for patients, family and society, give relevance to the subject. The time elapsed between trauma and surgery, which is the ideal treatment, has influence on the results of treatment. In Brazil this time is extended. There are conflicting evidence in the literature regarding mortality. The effects on quality of life are important since few patients resume activities from before the fracture. The objective of this study was to analyze the effects of time elapsed between trauma and surgery on the direct costs of medical and hospital treatment and quality of life in the form of utility, measured by the instrument EuroQol-5D, a generic instrument for measuring quality of life that uses five dimensions and is transformed into utility through the population norms. The utility is a cardinal value that brings together measure morbidity and mortality ranges from 0, death, to 1, which is perfect health. Two subsamples were created. They were separated by time. One was Early, until 4 days between trauma and surgery and the other was Late, until four days after. A decision tree was used as a model for analysis, to understand the event and calculate the odds of in-hospital deaths, deaths during the recovery and result in utility, as well as the costs. The average time between fracture and surgery in this sample of 115 patients was 9.35 days, with the average hospital stay of 13.45 days. The results, after being managed by age, gender, type of fracture, type of treatment and anesthetic risk (ASA) demonstrated clinically meaningful influence of time on inhospital mortality and statistically significant on costs (p <0.001) mainly due to nursery daily rate (p<0.001).The patient's stay was also statistically increased in the late surgery group (p <0.001). The average cost of the sample was R$ 5,132.31 (DP= 3,201.92). The cost-utility ratio of the model was R $ 9,854.34 per QALY for the early surgery strategy. This strategy proved to be dominant in the model and consistently dominant after analyzing the sensitivity of extremes. The delay of the surgery in our region, is primarily due to the delay in the transfer from the hospital that receives the patient to the hospital that has the complexity to treat him. The Brazilian-guidelines should include early surgery as part of the treatment goals because they are more cost-effective.