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Objective: To estimate the cost of wound care to the Irish health-care system. Methods: A bottom-up, prevalence-based analysis was undertaken using a decision analytic model to estimate costs. Health-care resource activity was identified from a recently published study from the UK and was valued using unit cost data for Ireland. Results: The base case analysis estimated the total annual healthcare cost of wound care to be €629,064,198 (95% Confidence interval (CI): €452,673,358 to €844,087,124), accounting for 5% (95% CI: 3% to 6%) of total public health expenditure in Ireland in 2013. The average cost per patient was €3,941 (95% CI: €2,836 to €5,287). However, this study is subject to many limitations and plausible changes in the model's inputs showed that the total annual health-care cost of wound care could range from €281,438,970 to €844,316,912. Conclusion: Caring for wounds places a substantial burden on the Irish health-care system. In light of growing pressures to finance an already resource-constrained health-care system, these results provide useful information for those charged with future wound care service design and provision in Ireland and elsewhere. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Randomised controlled trials are widely accepted as the gold standard method to evaluate medical interventions, but they are still open to bias. One such bias is the effect of patient's preference on outcome measures. The aims of this study were to examine whether patients' treatment preference affected clearance of plantar warts and explore whether there were any associations between patients' treatment preference and baseline variables in the EverT trial. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]