Purpose: To determine the total direct costs (fixed and variable costs) of diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) and MR tractography reconstruction of the brain. Materials and Methods: The direct fixed and variable costs of DTI with MR tractography were determined prospectively with time and motion analysis in a 1.5-Tesla MR scanner using 15 encoding directions. Seventeen patients with seizure disorde...

From 1980 to 1990 we found progressive increases in workload (number of billable tests; 12.1% per year), staffing [number of full-time equivalents (FTEs); 5.6% per year], "revenues" (gross billings; 25.8% per year), and direct cost (12.9% per year) in the clinical chemistry laboratory of a large tertiary-care university medical center. The increase in direct cost was mainly attributable to an i...

We introduce a novel scheme for spread spectrum systems, which we call the offset code spreading scheme. By employing the scheme, we can implement a directconversion receiver for a differential-binary phase shift keying system with a DC-cut high pass filter. This will allow us to eliminate the DC-offset by carrier leakage and mitigate the 1/f noise of the mixer. System simulations show that a 1...

OBJECTIVES To describe the pharmaceutical use, health care resource utilisation patterns, and annual direct medical cost of epilepsy as well as determining the impact of various demographic and clinical characteristics on total costs of epilepsy in Oman. METHODS Medical and pharmacy data were collected for 6 months on all patients aged > or =13 years attending the Sultan Qaboos University Hos...

CONTEXT AND OBJECTIVE Knowledge of socioeconomic impact of attempted suicide may sensitize managers regarding prevention strategies. There are no published data on this in Brazil. The aim here was to describe the direct and indirect costs of care of hospitalized cases of attempted suicide and compare these with the costs of acute coronary syndrome cases. DESIGN AND SETTING Cost-of-illness stu...

♦ Objective: To estimate 12-month osteoporosis-related health care resource utilization and direct medical cost for patients who were hospitalized with osteoporotic fractures in Tianjin, China. ♦ Methods: Data were obtained from Tianjin Urban Employee Basic Medical Insurance database (2008-2011). Included patients were ≥50 years old, with their first osteoporotic fracture hospitalization from J...

Background Related to escalating health care costs and the questionable effectiveness of multiple interventions including lumbar facet joint interventions, cost effectiveness or cost utility analysis has become the cornerstone of evidence-based medicine influencing coverage decisions. Methods Cost utility of therapeutic lumbar facet joint nerve blocks in managing chronic low back pain was per...