Table 3.

Analysis of cost effectiveness of cervical therapeutic medial branch nerve blocks in managing chronic pain (USD $).

	Group I (bupivacaine without steroid)	Group II (bupivacaine with steroid)	Pooled
Number of patients	60	60	120
Total number of procedures for 2 years	342	344	686
Number of treatments for 2 years per patient (mean) ± SD	5.7 ± 2.4	5.7 ± 2.1	5.7 ± 2.2
Number of weeks with significant improvement for all patients in the study in weeks	4999	5326	10325
Significant improvement in two years per patient (mean) ± SD	83.3 ± 27.4	88.8 ± 21.1	86.0 ± 24.6
Significant improvement in weeks per procedure (mean) ± SD	15.0 ± 12.31	16.1 ± 14.1	15.6 ± 12.3
Total Cost USD ($)
Physician	$66,652.26	$72,340.20	$138,992.46
Facility	$179,037.97	$188,619.19	$367,657.16
Total	$245,690.23	$260,959.38	$506,649.61
Cost per procedure USD ($)
Physician	$194.89	$210.29	$202.61
Facility	$523.50	$548.31	$535.94
Total	$718.39	$758.60	$738.56
Direct total costs per patient for two years USD ($)	$4,094.84	$4,349.32	$4,222.08
Direct procedural costs without medical therapy for 1-year improvement in quality of life USD ($)	$2,555.69	$2,547.86	$2,551.65
Indirect costs including drugs USD ($) for one-year improvement of life	$1,712.31	$1,707.06	$1,709.60
Total estimated cost USD ($) including procedural costs, drug costs, and indirect costs for one-year improvement in quality of life	$4,268.00	$4,254.92	$4,261.25