Is early and periodic screening, diagnosis, and treatment (EPSDT) worthwhile?

The State and Federal governments invest many tax dollars to provide health screening for millions of Medicaid families. Justification for such investment is based on the experience of Sweden's screening of 4-year-old children, a University of Texas Health Service Center study on cost benefit of EPSDT, and the Michigan experience. In Sweden's health screening program, health problems of functional importance were found in 21.6% of the screenees, and 71.8% of these were newly discovered by the screening. The results of Texas study indicated that an effective EPSDT program would result in a savings of $43 billion in 1976 currency over a 20-year period. In Michigan, a drop of 13% occurred in the referral rate for health problems during a 6-month period among those who were screened a second time or more.