The primary objective of this study was to estimate the costs and healthcare resource utilization (HCRU) associated with atopic dermatitis (AD) in Chinese pediatric patients and to investigate the factors contributing to the costs of AD. This cross-sectional study employed a convenience sampling approach, with patient-level data obtained from a nationwide survey conducted across 31 provinces in China between February and March of 2022, utilizing an internet-based questionnaire. Caregivers of children under 18 years old with a physician-confirmed diagnosis of atopic dermatitis were recruited, and sociodemographic information, clinical characteristics, HCRU data, time spent on caregiving, and disease-related costs were collected from all eligible participants. A total of 599 eligible families were included in the study. Among them, 82.5% of families reported that their child had at least one outpatient or emergency room visit, while 5.8% of families reported that their child had been hospitalized in the past 12 months. The average annual cost across all cost categories amounted to 28 591.92 yuan per patient per year (PPPY), with 92.8% attributed to direct costs. Out-of-pocket expenses accounted for 90.7% of the cost of outpatient or emergency room visits and 43.4% of the cost of hospitalization. Factors associated with higher annual total costs included moderate (coefficient ± SE: 0.22 ± 0.09, P = 0.012) and severe AD patient groups (coefficient ± SE: 0.58 ± 0.15, P < 0.001), onset of AD on the head, neck, or hands (coefficient ± SE: 0.57 ± 0.14, P < 0.001), use of biological agents (coefficient ± SE: 0.64 ± 0.11, P < 0.001), and use of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) (coefficient ± SE: 0.26 ± 0.09, P = 0.003), compared with their respective reference groups. This study highlighted a considerable economic burden of AD among pediatric patients in China across different disease severity groups, with significantly higher costs observed in patients with more severe disease. Additionally, factors such as disease severity, clinical characteristics, and treatment modalities might contribute to the higher costs encountered by pediatric patients with AD.
>
>