Economic impact of homeopathic practice

A new study compares the costs generated by conventional, homeopathic and mixed medical practice in French general medicine and finds that management of patients by homeopathic GPs may be 20% less expensive than management by conventional medicine GPs, offering an important contribution to reduce public health expenditure.

The study analyses the cost of consultations, the cost of prescriptions and the combination of the two (consultation plus prescription) for each type of practice, and differentiated between public costs and patient out-of-pocket costs.

While consultation costs were higher for homeopathic doctors than for conventional doctors, due to the different nature of the consultation, costs for prescribed medicines were considerably lower for homeopathic than for conventional treatment. The overall cost, taking into account both public and patient costs, was 20% less for patients consulting homeopathic GPs than for conventional medicine GPs, while the cost just to social security was 35% lower. Homeopathic GPs prescribed noticeably fewer psychotropic drugs, antibiotics and non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs.

The study was funded by Boiron Laboratoires.