Journal
OBESITY REVIEWS
Volume 12, Issue 1, Pages 50-61Publisher
WILEY
DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-789X.2009.00708.x
Keywords
Costs and cost analysis; healthcare costs; obesity
Categories
Funding
- National Institutes of Health [5-K12-HD043459-04]
- University of Pennsylvania
- Merck Co., Inc.
- Merck
- EUNICE KENNEDY SHRIVER NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF CHILD HEALTH &HUMAN DEVELOPMENT [K12HD043459] Funding Source: NIH RePORTER
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P>To estimate per-person and aggregate direct medical costs of overweight and obesity and to examine the effect of study design factors. PubMed (1968-2009), EconLit (1969-2009) and Business Source Premier (1995-2009) were searched for original studies. Results were standardized to compute the incremental cost per overweight person and per obese person, and to compute the national aggregate cost. A total of 33 US studies met review criteria. Among the four highest-quality studies, the 2008 per-person direct medical cost of overweight was $266 and of obesity was $1723. The aggregate national cost of overweight and obesity combined was $113.9 billion. Study design factors that affected cost estimates included use of national samples vs. more selected populations, age groups examined, inclusion of all medical costs vs. obesity-related costs only, and body mass index cut-offs for defining overweight and obesity. Depending on the source of total national healthcare expenditures used, the direct medical cost of overweight and obesity combined is approximately 5.0% to 10% of US healthcare spending. Future studies should include nationally representative samples, evaluate adults of all ages, report all medical costs and use standard body mass index cut-offs.
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