Table 2.

Costing data for economic analysis.

Identification	Measurement	Valuation	Comments
Program Development
Health care professional time (physician, nurse, pharmacist)	Estimated hours for each health care professional to create care algorithm (algorithm start-up costs); Estimated hours for staff training to administer care algorithm (training costs)	Alberta Health Services wage rates, Alberta Health Care Insurance Plan/Alternate Funding Plan	Cost per patient estimated by plausible number of patients in program/managed per staff
IT infrastructure	Equipment required to setup BPatelemonitoring and hours of IT support will be estimated from local experience and TeleMED input.	Wage rates. Price lists of IT equipment from manufacturer.	Costs apportioned over # of patients monitored in region over 5 years (estimated lifespan of equipment).
Program Delivery
Equipment	Number of home BP cuffs (standard and telemonitoring)	List price	Includes expected lifetime/repair costs and replacement.
Internet/data	Mobile phone device/data plan used for telemonitoring (tested in sensitivity analysis).	Local cost of lowest priced suitable service	Included in sensitivity analysis, may be paid by health provider or patient (societal perspective)
Medication use	Type, dose, frequency, and duration of use.	Alberta Blue Cross
Health care professional time (pharmacist)	Estimated hours for staff to administer care algorithm (ongoing costs)	Alberta Health Services wage rates, Alberta Health Care Insurance Plan/lternate Funding Plan	Cost per patient estimated by plausible number of patients in program/managed per staff
Staff costs/infrastructure	IT support/telemedicine portal/fax costs	TeleMED	Costs apportioned over # of patients monitored in region over 5 years.
Utilization
Physician visits	Number of primary care or hypertension specialist visits over 12 months (patient reported).	Alberta Health Ambulatory Care Case Costing (utilizing National Ambulatory Care Reporting System)	Telemonitoring ± case management may reduce need for physician visits for BP management, scenarios tested in SA.
Emergency department visits	Number of emergency room visits over 12 months attributable to BP or complications of treatment	Alberta Schedule of Benefits	Study may be underpowered to detect emergency department visits. Safety end points will be examined and likely resource use for each safety end point will be estimated.
Hospitalizations	Number of hospitalizations over 12 months attributable to BP or complications of treatment	Alberta Health administrative data
Societal costs	Patient and caregiver time costs for physician visits, emergency department visits, out of pocket medication costs. May also include data/mobile phone costs (explored in sensitivity analysis).	Standard Alberta wage rates (human capital approach)	Explored using a societal perspective.

^aBP: blood pressure