Patient and program costs, and outcomes, of including gender-sensitive services in intensive inpatient programs for substance use

Gender-sensitive services (GSS) attempt to make substance use treatment better for women, but at what cost and with what results? We sought answers to these questions in a federally-funded study by measuring separately the patient and provider costs of adding GSS, outcomes, and cost-outcome relationships for 12 mixed-gender intensive inpatient programs (IIP) that varied in amounts and types of GSS. GSS costs to female inpatients included time devoted to GSS and expenses for care of dependents while in the IIP. GSS costs to providers included time spent with patients, indirect services, treatment facilities, equipment, and materials. Offering more GSS was expected to consume more patient and provider resources. Offering more GSS also was expected to enhance outcomes and cost-outcome relationships. We found that average GSS costs to patients at the IIPs were $585 ($515–$656) per patient. Average GSS costs to providers at the IIPs were $344 ($42–$544) per patient. GSS costs to patients significantly exceeded GSS costs to providers. Contrary to previous research, offering more GSS services to patients did not result in significantly higher costs to patients or providers. IIPs offering more GSS may have delivered fewer traditional services, but this did not significantly affect outcomes, i.e., days until returning to another substance use treatment. In fact, median cost-outcome for these IIPs was a promising 35 treatment-free days, i.e., over a month, per $100 of GSS resources used by patients and providers.