Diabetes Costs Patients an Additional $10,000 Annually

Diabetes is a costly chronic condition in the United States, medical costs and productivity loss attributable to diabetes were estimated to be $245 billion in 2012.

An issue brief from the Health Care Cost Institute, compared per capita spending for people with a diagnosis of diabetes for individuals covered by employer-sponsored insurance and younger than age 65 with those without a diagnosis for the years 2009 through 2013. During that period, spending for individuals with diabetes increased by roughly $1000 to about $15,000 per capita.

The average per capita spending difference between people with and without diabetes was $10,310. Additionally, during this period, people with diabetes spent on average 2.5 times more out of pocket than people without diabetes. Among individuals with diabetes, children (ages 0 through 18) and pre-Medicare adults (ages 55 through 64) were the 2 groups with the highest per capita healthcare spending in every year of the study period.

Read more at the Health Care Cost Institute: http://bit.ly/1H5n857