Good agreement between questionnaire and administrative databases for health care use and costs in patients with osteoarthritis

Table 6 Incremental research costs associated with the methods used to collect health care use and cost data*

	OCC-Q	GP records	Hospital database	Medical imaging records	New Zealand Health Information System	Combined databases
	$	$	$	$	$	$
Materials (× 50)	170.04	0	0	0	0	0
• 13 page questionnaire
• Cover letter
• 1 Legal envelope
• 1 Letter envelope
• Return postage
Printing, assembling, mailing (time)†	83.60	0	0	0	0	0
Telephone follow-up†	42.85	0	1.67	1.67	3.55	6.89
Emails†	0	0	1.67	1.67	1.67	5.01
Query design	0	0	784.58‡	150.47‡	141.22‡	1076.27
Data collection (patient level)	217.78†	262.09†	232.73§	135.23§	0	630.05
Questionnaire scanning†	51.21	0	0	0	0	0
Data normalization†	334.40	250.80	125.4	41.80	167.20	585.20
Travel reimbursement	0	176.80¶	0	0	0	176.80
Query building/reporting fee	0	160.00	0	0	200.00	360.00
Total cost	899.88	849.69	1146.01	330.84	513.64	2840.22

*All monetary values are in 2009 New Zealand dollars (NZD); the conversion rate to US dollars (USD) at 2009 purchasing power parity is $1 NZD = $0.63 USD
Abbreviations: OCC-Q, Osteoarthritis Cost and Consequences Questionnaire; GP, general practitioner
†Time valued at research assistant hourly rate of $20.90
‡Hospital database query design
§Hospital database: 7 hours of computer analyst time ($32.50), 0.25 hours research assistant time ($20.90), radiology database: 4 hours computer analyst time, 0.25 hours research assistant time
¶Travel reimbursement was $0.85/Km

ISSN: 1471-2288