Background. Knowledge of the cost of care for children with HIV infection is necessary to analyze the economic impact of recommendations for universal counseling and voluntary HIV testing of pregnant women, Objectives, To estimate the total cost of care for children with HIV infection, Methods, We performed a retrospective cohort study of all 88 children with (n = 29) or at risk for (n = 59) perinatally acquired HIV infection cared for at Children's Hospital of Wisconsin between February 2, 1987, and June 1, 1995. Review of medical records for all 29 children with perinatally acquired HIV infection or AIDS identified: date of HIV diagnosis; date of classification into Category N, A, B or C; date of AIDS diagnosis; and date of death or transfer of care, The time each subject remained in each CDC category was calculated and the Kaplan-Meier product-limit method was used to calculate survival time for all patients in each CDC category, Hospital-based inpatient and outpatient charges per patient per month in each CDC category (N, A, B, C and AIDS) were calculated with information from the hospital financial services database, and lifetime hospital-based inpatient and outpatient charges were estimated as the sum of the charges for each category, From that, total charges were calculated assuming that hospital based charges were 83% of total charges, Results, Based on a median survival time of 120 months, the mean lifetime charges for hospital-based care for children with HIV infection was $408 307 (estimates ranged from $172 217 to $498 539), If hospital-based care represents 83% of the total charges for care of children with HIV infection, then mean total lifetime charges for care of children with HIV infection were $491 936 ($207 490 to $600 649), Conclusions, The care of children with HIV infection is expensive, This information may be useful in planning for care programs and for analyzing the economic impact of recommendations for universal counseling and voluntary HIV testing of pregnant women.
