Published Indian studies on the economic burden of juvenile idiopathic arthritis (JIA) are lacking.
A prospective observational study recruited pediatric patients aged from 1 to 12 years with JIA in the pediatric rheumatology clinic of a public sector tertiary care hospital. Direct healthcare costs and indirect costs for transportation, accommodation of the caregivers, and productivity loss for work absenteeism were assessed.
The proportions of direct annualized cost assessed in 60 patients (mean (SD) age 8.46 (2.24) year) spent on outpatient visits, blood tests, imaging investigations, other tests, medications and hospitalization were 0.85%, 12.8%, 9.0%, 2.9%, 41.7% and 32.7%, respectively. Direct healthcare costs for blood tests and medicine were lowest in oligoarticular JIA and highest in systemic onset JIA and (P=0.043 and 0.001 respectively). The direct and indirect costs were higher with the use of biologic agents (n=9) than in those without (n=51).
JIA imposes considerable economic burden with the largest share attributable to medicines, and maximum in those with systemic onset JIA.