The effectiveness of preventive care at reducing curative care risk for the Taiwanese elderly under National Health Insurance

Chin-Shyan Chen, Yu-I Peng, Ping-Chang Lee and Tsai-Ching Liu

Health Policy, 2015, vol. 119, issue 6, 787-793

Abstract: Whether provision of free preventive care for the elderly under National Health Insurance has reduced the risk for curative care use raises much concern in Taiwan. This study analyzes the relationship by examining the impact of health examination utilization on the utilizations of outpatient care and inpatient care. Data come from the 2005 National Health Interview Survey and National Health Insurance Research Database. A two-stage method is used in the estimation. We found a negative relationship between the utilization of preventive care and hospitalization care in terms of length of stay and medical expenditures. On average, the elderly people who used preventive care tended to have 16 shorter hospitalization stays and NTD64,220 lower hospitalization expenditures than their counterparts. In order to improve the health of the elderly and reduce the escalation of medical expenditures due to aging, including preventive care in the health insurance is a very effective strategy.

Keywords: Preventive care; Curative care; Risk; Elderly; National Health Insurance; Taiwan (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2015
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:hepoli:v:119:y:2015:i:6:p:787-793

DOI: 10.1016/j.healthpol.2015.01.004

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