Impact of intensive care unit (ICU) drug use on hospital costs: A descriptive analysis, with recommendations for optimizing ICU pharmacotherapy

Objective. To determine the cost impact of intensive care unit (ICU) drug use on a hospital's total drug expense and to compare ICU pharmacy resource utilization with resource utilization of other hospital departments that provided services to the ICU. Additionally, to suggest strategies, based on these methods and results, to optimize ICU drug use. Methods. Financial transactions for all ICU patients (n = 23,107) treated during fiscal years 1999-2002 were retrieved from the hospital's data repository. ICU drug costs were calculated both as the percentage of total drug costs for each fiscal year and adjusted for hospital volume (ICU patient days). ICU department charges were calculated as a percentage of total ICU charges and analyzed by simple descriptive statistics (mean +/- so). Drug utilization was retrieved for those patients accounting for the highest percentage of ICU pharmacy charges. Main Results: ICU drug costs accounted for 38.4% ( +/-4.1% So) of the total drug costs and have increased at a rate greater than non-ICU drug costs (12% vs. 6%). ICU pharmacy charges accounted for an average of 11.1% (+/-9.2% so) of the total ICU charges, ranking as the fourth most costly of ICU charges. Both costly and highly used ICU therapies were identified for focus on cost-effectiveness analyses or application of an evidence-based drug use and disease state management program model to ICU pharmacotherapy. Conclusions. ICU drug therapies have a significant impact on hospital costs, and effective clinical informatics services and multidisciplinary collaboration programs are necessary to optimize ICU pharmacotherapy.