Background and aim of study:
Measures to reduce premature births and outreach services for expectant mothers/parents and infants were identified as possible focus areas of a reorientation of parent-child preventive care. The aim of the report is to estimate the immediate financial consequences for public payers (budget impact) that are associated with the introduction of such measures in Austria.

Method:
We calculated running programme costs, the expected health outcomes and the associated cost-saving potentials as well as the resulting total costs for the most promising measures that were identified via (economic) literature reviews. The analysis was carried out for a five-year time horizon from a public payer’s perspective.

Results:
Preterm birth: Depending on the type of programme, programme costs varied between < 50,000 € and 2 Mio. €. In the majority of scenarios analysed, potential cost-savings outweigh expected programme costs. From an efficiency perspective, the "cervix screening + progesterone" and the "vaginal infection screening" programmes appear superior to the "progesterone injection", "fish oil" and "smoking cessation" programmes.
Outreach services: cost-savings in the hospital sector due to outreach services following early discharge after normal birth seem to outweigh programme costs. Outreach services in early childhood are most expensive with a lower likelihood for (economic) benefits, however from all programmes analysed they are the only ones that primarily tackle health inequalities.

Conclusion:
Apart from clinical benefits most of the programmes analysed most likely will result in economic benefits. The implementation in the form of a pilot project with an accompanying evaluation is recommendable.