Cost effectiveness is an important issue among health care customers, professionals and decision makers. The purpose of this paper was to identify and critically review published research in the field of health care costs, emphasising rehabilitation and especially physiotherapy. A computer-assisted literature search was conducted in September 1999 using the Medline database. The number of papers identified for this review was 27. The emphasis was specifically placed on physiotherapy in 19 studies. The most commonly used study design was the randomised controlled trial (n = 16). The parameters used to calculate the costs were very different in each paper. The most common symptoms among the patients in this research area were problems with the spine (n = 7). The rest of the studies focused on a variety of symptoms. In conclusion, it can be stated that only a minor part of the physiotherapy research identified focused on costs.

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