Cervical Cancer Screening Cost Analysis

The costs (2021 Euros, €) of diagnostic tests (i.e., cytology, colposcopy and biopsy) were considered in the study and were retrieved from Portuguese official sources (Table 3) [20 , 21 ]. The consumption of healthcare resources was estimated based on the Portuguese legislation and the clinical consensus from the Portuguese Society of Gynecology on cervical cancer screening [2 , 17 ]. Unit costs of HPV tests were not considered, since it was assumed that the three HPV tests had the same purchase price. However, the cost of HPV genotyping was considered every time a Hybrid Capture® 2 test was performed because the test alone does not allow to differentiate HPV genotypes (Table 3) [22 ].Table 3

Use of healthcare resources and associated costs

Healthcare resource	Unit costs	Reference/source
HPV tests
Hybrid Capture® 2	0€	Assumption
Cobas® 4800	0€	Assumption
Aptima® HPV	0€	Assumption
HPV genotyping after Hybrid Capture® 2
HPV genotyping	685.18€*	Qiagen, 2021
Diagnostic tests
Cytology	15.2€	Diário da República, 2018 (Code 30,510)
Colposcopy	14.5€	Diário da República, 2018 (Code 48,180)
Colposcopy + Biopsy	34.4€	Diário da República, 2018 (Code 48,190)

*575£—a formula was used to convert Pounds into Euros [23 ]