The cost of breast cancer screening in France

Purpose. This paper presents the cost of two decentralised breast cancer screening programmes in France, in the Bas-Rhin and the Bouches du Rhone districts. Materials and methods. The costs directly related to running the two screening programmes were collected for the time period 1990-1997. Only direct costs of each programme, excluding assessment and treatment costs, are included in the cost analysis. Costs are presented per screening period, per programme attender and per cancer detected by screening. Results. The screening programme costs an average of 397 francs per woman screened and 90828 francs per cancer detected in the Bas-Rhin, and 379 francs and 76159 francs, respectively, in the Bouches du Rhone. Conclusions. These costs are high compared to those of existing centralised programmes. Further research is needed to investigate means of ensuring the optimal efficiency of these programmes. The results of this study may help guide future decisions on the further development of breast cancer screening in France.