Cardinal Health

Preventing Venous Thromboembolism: A Healthcare Professional Guide to Intervention 6 Prevalence & Cost. Why Focus on Venous Thromboembolism? VTE is estimated to be one of the leading preventable causes of death in hospital with modelling of healthcare statistics showing that PE accounts for 7% of all deaths in Australian hospitals every year. In almost 25% of people affected, sudden death is the first clinical sign of PE. 5 Incidence. The silent nature of VTE prevents precise prevalence reporting. • Estimates suggest that symptomatic VTE affects about 1 per 1,000 Australians per year. 5 • Based on epidemiological evidence, VTE was estimated to be responsible for 5,285 deaths in Australia in 2008. 6 • DVT occurs in over 50% of some categories of hospitalised patients if prophylaxis is not used. 7 Cost. In 2008 the financial cost of VTE was $1.72 billion (0.15% of GDP). 7 Of this: • 1.38 billion (80%) was productivity lost primarily due to premature death of Australians with VTE. • 162 million (9.4%) was the efficiency loss from taxation forgone and government health expenditures. • 146 million (8.6%) was direct health care expenditure. • 22 million (1.3%) was bring-forward of funeral costs. • 12 million (0.7%) was the value of the informal care of people with VTE. VTE costs $116,000 per case per annum. Including the loss of wellbeing, the cost approaches 1.5 million per person. 6 Mortality. • VTE deaths represent some 7% of all deaths in Australian hospitals. 6 • In Australia VTE causes more deaths than all transport accidents and falls combined. It is a bigger killer than bowel or breast cancer and over 40 times more deadly than AIDS. 6 • VTE is the largest preventable cause of death in hospitalised patients. 8 • Death occurs in approximately 6% of DVT cases and 12% of PE cases within one month of diagnosis. 9 • 10% of maternal deaths are due to VTE. 10 • VTE is the most common cause of 30 day mortality in patients who underwent surgery for cancer. 11 • In stroke PE accounts for 5% of deaths and is the 3rd most common cause of death after Stroke. 12 • Obese patients have a significantly higher frequency of PE as the immediate cause of death. 13 In Australia, 30,000 cases of hospital-associated Venous Thromboembolism (VTE) occur every year. 5 30,000 Affected Per Year. Recurrence. • History of VTE is the largest predictor of a patient having another VTE event, it is estimated that the cumulative recurrence rate after one year is 12.9% after two years 16.6% after five years as 22.8% and after 10 years as 30.4%. 14 • 15-25% of thromboembolic events in pregnancy are recurrent events. 10 • Symptomatic DVTs have a 30% recurrence rate. 15