Objectives: Examine the impacts of age, diabetes, gender, and access type on vascular access (VA) associated costs among Chinese hemodialysis (HD) patients.
Methods: We retrospectively included patients whose first permanent VA was created at the West China Hospital. Clinical characteristics, maturation, intervention, utilization, and exchange of every VA, as well as VA-related infection were collected. The study period for each patient was from HD initiation to the last follow-up. VA-related costs, including those for placement and intervention procedures, were calculated according to the standards set in 2019 for Chinese tertiary hospitals. Mann-Whitney U and Chi-square tests were conducted for comparisons between groups.
Results: A total of 358 Chinese HD patients experienced functionally 143 arteriovenous fistula (AVF), 22 arteriovenous graft (AVG), and 439 tunneled cuffed central venous catheter (tcCVC) during a median study period of 26 (IQR 13-44) months, of which 42.5% used more than one permanent VA. The median annual VA-related cost in the groups of age >75 years and ⩽75 years, diabetes and non-diabetes, male and female, was $525 and $397 (p = 0.016), $459 and $462 (p = 0.64), $476 and $445 (p = 0.94), respectively. The median monthly costs for AVF ($18), AVG ($289), and tcCVC ($37) were significantly different.
Conclusion: HD patients aged >75 years had significantly higher annual VA-related costs. However, the annual VA-related costs did not differ across the diabetes groups or the gender groups. AVF was the most cost-effective permanent VA type in China, partly due to the inexpensive materials used compared to AVG or tcCVC.
Keywords: Hemodialysis; age; costs; diabetes; gender; vascular access.