Early Intervention Program for High-Risk Youth: Preliminary Evidence on Costs Avoided

Significant health and economic costs are associated with children being removed and placed into state care. Intensive, early intervention programs may support young, at-risk individuals to reduce child removals resulting in improved health and economic outcomes. Using routinely collected administrative service data, this study provides preliminary insights into the value of a government-funded, therapeutic, trauma-responsive, social care program supporting at-risk young people. Descriptive costs avoided were estimated based on case notes supplemented with evidence from the literature. The program cost AUD17,614 annually per person, generating net avoided costs of AUD1.37 million per year for the participating cohort of 26 clients. Threshold analyses suggested the program needed to prevent 4.12 children being placed into care annually to be cost neutral. Several key assumptions were made to generate these results due to limited data. These assumptions are detailed and several recommendations are made to reduce uncertainty in future estimates. Importantly, additional evidence is required to conduct further economic evaluations of similar community-based social and healthcare programs. More empirical evidence and rigorous evaluation built in prior to program commencement would support more robust economic evaluations. IMPLICATIONS Preliminary analyses suggest a trauma-responsive, social health, early intervention program supporting young, at-risk, pregnant care-leavers may generate reduced healthcare system costs. More rigorous evaluation of social health programs established prior to commencement would support robust economic evaluations.