The cost burden of new-onset atrial fibrillation (AF) has not previously been studied with unselected nationwide data.

We analyzed differences in the distribution and time course of costs from all categories of healthcare services in patients receiving direct oral anticoagulants (DOACs), warfarin, or no anticoagulation during the first year following diagnosis of AF.

This sub-study of the Finnish AntiCoagulation in Atrial Fibrillation (FinACAF) project comprised all new-onset AF patients from 2011 to 2017 in Finland with an indication for oral anticoagulation treatment. The registry data included information on primary and secondary care services as well as social care services, drug purchases, laboratory data, and reimbursed private care and travel services. We report inverse probability of treatment weighted average costs for different pharmaceutical groups with bootstrapped confidence intervals.

In total, 130,745 patients (66,610 on warfarin, 32,996 on DOACs) were included. Weighted first-year costs after onset of AF were €11,364 for rivaroxaban (n = 13,230), €12,642 for apixaban (n = 11,886), €11,403 for dabigatran (n = 7514), and €10,752 for edoxaban (n = 366). Costs were clustered near the diagnosis of AF. Costs for warfarin patients were inversely related to the quality of anticoagulation therapy. Average first-year costs for warfarin patients were €15,860, higher than for patients on DOACs by €3218–€5108. Patients without any oral anticoagulation had the highest first-year costs, €17,682. Patients with high risk of stroke had higher total costs, both in patients using DOACs and warfarin.

DOACs had lower total costs than warfarin despite higher drug expenses. Patients without any oral anticoagulation had the highest costs.