单选题 Although custom prosthetic bone replacements produced through a new computer-aided design process will cost more than twice as much as ordinary replacements, custom replacements should still be cost-effective. Not only will surgery and recovery time be reduced, but custom replacements should last longer, thereby reducing the need for further hospital stays.
Which of the following must be studied in order to evaluate the argument presented above?

A、 The amount of time a patient spends in surgery versus the amount of time spent recovering from surgery.
B、 The amount by which the cost of producing custom replacements has declined with the introduction of the new technique for producing them.
C、 The degree to which the use of custom replacements is likely to reduce the need for repeat surgery when compared with the use of ordinary replacements.
D、 The degree to which custom replacements produced with the new technique are more carefully manufactured than are ordinary replacements.
E、 (E) The amount by which custom replacements produced with the new technique will drop in cost as the production procedures become standardized and applicable on a larger scale.

【正确答案】 C

【答案解析】[解析] 尽管生产成本更昂贵，由于其他开支的节省可以使定制的骨替代物成为节省成本的选择。为评论该论述，必须决定这些节省能否抵消增加的成本，因此需要研究期望的再次住院需要减少的情况，选项(C)是正确答案；该论述并不要求研究手术与恢复时间的比率，因此(A)不合适；过去和将来的成本变化与评论一项建立在目前计划的成本基础上的论述无关，因此选项(B)和(E)不合适；最后，由于研究生产定制替代物的仔细程度自身不能提供关于成本的信息，选项(D)也不正确。