Impact of specialist ataxia centres on health service resource utilisation and costs across Europe: cross-sectional survey

Morris, Stephen; Vallortigara, Julie; Greenfield, Julie; Hunt, Barry; Hoffman, Deborah; Reinhard, Carola; Graessner, Holm; Federico, Antonio; Quoidbach, Vinciane; Giunti, Paola

doi:10.1186/s13023-023-02971-4

Orphanet Journal of Rare Diseases

Table 2 Health care contacts over a one-year period for non-SAC and SAC patients in three European countries

From: Impact of specialist ataxia centres on health service resource utilisation and costs across Europe: cross-sectional survey

	Patients who reported never attending a SAC				Patients who reported attending a SAC currently
Health care contacts	N	Mean	Std. Dev.	Median	N	Mean	Std. Dev.	Median	P-value†	P-value‡
United Kingdom
Specialist centre visits	109	0	0	0	72	1	0	1	< 0.01	< 0.01
General Practitioner visits	108	2.3	3.5	0	58	1.9	3.3	0	0.40	0.51
Neurologist outpatient visits	115	1.5	2.9	0	59	1.3	2.6	0	0.54	0.24
Inpatient stays	110	0.3	1.0	0	58	0.1	0.4	0	0.20	0.17
Accident & Emergency visits	112	0.3	1.0	0	60	0.3	1.0	0	0.65	0.82
Physiotherapy visits	109	1.6	3.2	0	64	3.1	4.5	0	0.01	0.11
Speech and Language therapy visits	113	0.7	1.8	0	60	0.3	0.7	0	0.06	0.23
Occupational Health Therapy visits	113	1.3	3.1	0	63	1.5	3.0	0	0.81	0.98
Other consultant specialist visits	109	0.7	2.1	0	59	3.0	3.3	1	< 0.01	< 0.01
Italy
Specialist centre visits	22	0	0	0	74	1.4	0.7	1	< 0.01	< 0.01
General Practitioner visits	19	1.3	2.6	0	54	0.7	1.3	0	0.20	0.39
Neurologist outpatient visits	20	2.7	5.0	1.5	55	0.4	0.7	0	< 0.01	0.02
Inpatient stays	19	0.3	0.6	0	57	0.3	0.6	0	0.91	0.51
Accident & Emergency visits	18	0.3	0.8	0	57	0.1	0.4	0	0.30	0.17
Physiotherapy visits	21	19.0	19.6	10	63	14.5	19.8	2	0.37	0.40
Speech and Language therapy visits	19	7.8	11.6	1	61	6.4	12.7	1	0.67	0.78
Occupational Health Therapy visits	18	1.5	2.7	0	50	1.3	4.1	0	0.88	0.95
Other consultant specialist	18	1.6	4.0	0	59	1.9	5.5	0	0.80	0.28
Germany
Specialist centre visits	10	0.0	0.0	0	33	1.3	0.9	1	< 0.01	0.01
General Practitioner visits	8	5.5	10.1	2	34	4.9	5.2	3.5	0.80	0.23
Neurologist outpatient visits	11	3.7	3.1	3	30	2.5	2.9	2	0.23	0.47
Inpatient stays	10	0.0	0.0	0	31	0.3	0.7	0	0.24	0.24
Accident & Emergency visits	9	0.1	0.3	0	31	0.6	2.7	0	0.59	0.92
Physiotherapy visits	11	33.7	22.8	50	28	27.9	23.7	40	0.49	0.92
Speech and Language therapy visits	10	8.9	18.5	0	33	11.5	17.2	1	0.69	0.02
Occupational Health Therapy visits	10	7.9	17.2	0	30	10.4	17.7	0	0.70	0.41
Other consultant specialist visits	9	1.6	2.3	1	28	1.6	2.0	1	0.95	0.54
P-value§
Specialist centre visits	-				0.01
General Practitioner visits	< 0.01				< 0.01
Neurologist outpatient visits	0.10				< 0.01
Inpatient stays	0.92				0.35
Accident & Emergency visits	0.53				0.18
Physiotherapy visits	< 0.01				< 0.01
Speech and Language therapy visits	< 0.01				< 0.01
Occupational Health Therapy visits	< 0.01				< 0.01
Other consultant specialist visits	0.16				0.30

† Test for significant differences in mean contacts between non-SAC and SAC groups (unadjusted)
‡ Test for significant differences in mean contacts between non-SAC and SAC groups (adjusted for age, sex, number of symptoms and number of comorbidities)
§ Test for significant differences in mean contacts between countries separately for non-SAC and SAC groups (adjusted for age, sex, number of symptoms and number of comorbidities)
SAC, specialist ataxia centre; N, number of participants who responded to that question

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ISSN: 1750-1172

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