OBJECTIVES: Nowadays, there is a general agreement about the need of including future related medical costs in life years gained while no consensus has been achieved about future unrelated medical costs (indirect medical costs) and future non-medical costs. The aim of this study has been to assess the extension of published economic evaluations that incorporated future costs and what types of future cost were included. METHODS: Three general health economic journals (Pharmacoeconomics, Value in Health and European Journal of Health economics) were reviewed to identify economic evaluations from 2008 to 2011. Only complete economic evaluations were accepted for this research. From each selected article, future cost inclusion was evaluated along with the type of future costs included. RESULTS: A total of 148 articles were founded from the three journals fulfilling the inclusion criteria. 67 of them (45.27 %) incorporated future related medical costs, 9 (6.08 %) included also future unrelated medical costs and none included future non-medical costs. Percentage of articles including future costs increased from 2008 (33 %) to 2011(57 %) and no differences were detected between the three journals in the proportion of economic evaluations incorporating future costs. CONCLUSIONS: Despite most of health economic guidelines advice the need of incorporating future costs in l economic evaluations, less than the half of articles reviewed incorporated them. Moreover, the inclusion of future unrelated medical costs and future non-medical costs was much lower. Results of economic evaluations can change dramatically depending on future costs inclusion. It is necessary to change the current practice and systematically include future related medical costs in the base case of economic evaluations and future unrelated medical costs and future non medical costs at least in sensitivity analysis.