An approach to hospital costs of cerebrovascular accidents

: Taking into account that stroke is an important health problem, we have carried out this study in order to know the hospital cost of stroke in our Community. We have revised all the 210 patients admitted to the Neurological Division of the Hospital Virgen de los Lirios de Alcoy between the 1st October 1990 and the 30th September 1992. The population of the area during this period was 133,915 inhabitants. The number of days staying in the hospital, the number of CT and IMR performed, the number of days that each patient was rehabilitated and the cost generated by all the ambulance transfers, were recorded. The total cost was 80,472,883 pts [hospital-stay: 73,735,200 pts (91.6%); CT: 3,922,000 pts (4.9%); IRM: 550,000 pts (0.7%); transfers: 982,492 pts (1.2%); rehabilitation: 1,283,191 pts (1.6%)]. This means a cost of 383,205 pts/patient, 220,474 pts/day and 1.7 pts/inhabitant/day.