Preferences for Enhanced Primary Care Services Among Older Individuals and Primary Care Physicians

Semra Ozdemir (), John Ansah and David Matchar
Additional contact information
Semra Ozdemir: Duke-NUS Medical School
John Ansah: Duke-NUS Medical School
David Matchar: Duke-NUS Medical School

Applied Health Economics and Health Policy, 2023, vol. 21, issue 5, No 9, 785-797

Abstract: Abstract Objective We aimed to identify the factors that are most important for community-dwelling older individuals (i.e., users) and primary care (PC) providers to enhance PC services. Methods Discrete choice experiment surveys were administered to 747 individuals aged ≥ 60 years and 242 PC physicians in Singapore between December 2020 and August 2021. Participants were asked to choose between two hypothetical PC clinics and their current clinic. Latent class models were used to estimate the relative attribute importance (RAI) and to calculate the predicted uptake for enhanced PC services. Results Based on the attributes and levels used in this study, the out-of-pocket cost (RAI: 47%) and types of services offered (RAI: 25%) were the most important attributes for users while working hours (RAI: 28%) and patient load (RAI: 25%) were the most important for providers. For out-of-pocket visit costs ranging from Singapore dollars (S)$100 to S$5, users’ predicted uptake for enhanced PC services ranged from 46 to 84%. For daily patient loads ranging from 60 to 20 patients, providers’ predicted uptake ranged from 64 to 91%, assuming their income remains unchanged. Conclusions Our study provides timely insights for the development of strategies to support the government’s new health care initiative (HealthierSG), which places PC at the center of Singapore’s healthcare system. The ability to choose their preferred clinic, low out-of-pocket costs and types of services offered (for users), and reasonable working conditions (for providers) were the key factors for users and providers to participate in enhanced PC services.

Date: 2023
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s40258-023-00809-5 Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:aphecp:v:21:y:2023:i:5:d:10.1007_s40258-023-00809-5

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer.com/economics/journal/40258

DOI: 10.1007/s40258-023-00809-5

Access Statistics for this article

Applied Health Economics and Health Policy is currently edited by Timothy Wrightson

More articles in Applied Health Economics and Health Policy from Springer
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().