Ocular diseases impact not only health care spending in the ophthalmologist’s office, but also patients’ productivity and quality of life. This study by Paudel and colleagues¹ found that across 3 countries, productivity costs and the value of quality of life lost were very important to the overall economic impact of late-stage age-related macular degeneration (AMD), even greater than the direct medical costs associated with treating this condition.

When economists evaluate the impact of policies or interventions, direct medical costs are a main focus, and other costs are often ignored; this is because direct medical costs are often relatively easy to quantify and are easily linked with diseases. However, to more fully capture the entire impact a given disease has on society, health economists recommend including a broad range of factors, including productivity costs and quality of life considerations, in economic analyses of health interventions and policies.²