BACKGROUND: Patients inevitably incur some cost for accessing health care, even in universal systems such as Canada. The COVID-19 pandemic dramatically shifted health care delivery from in-person to telehealth services, also shifting the proportion of costs offset by patients and their families by reducing the need to travel to in-person appointments. OBJECTIVE: This study aimed to develop a method for estimating the costs patients and their families incur and CO METHODS: We present a method to evaluate the costs associated with in-person and telehealth care appointments from the perspective of patients, their families, and the environment. We used ED locations, road distances, and duration of appointment to account for costs paid by patients (ie, lost productivity, informal caregiving, and out-of-pocket expenses) attributed to travel to receive medical care. Costs to the environment were evaluated by calculating the amount of CO RESULTS: Our method estimates that patients in British Columbia pay up to 00 (2023 CAD, CAD =US .86) on average to attend an in-person ED visit, depending on where they live
66 may be attributed to lost productivity, 3 to informal caregiving, and 0 to out-of-pocket expenses. These estimates are higher than most observed cost estimates. In addition, avoiding in-person care diverts up to 13 kg of CO CONCLUSIONS: We present a novel method for estimating patient-incurred costs and CO