An empirical investigation on the economic impact of shared patient information among doctors

Dain Jung, Do Won Kwak (), Hye-Jin Kim and Minki Kim

Applied Economics, 2020, vol. 52, issue 33, 3555-3573

Abstract: This study investigates how an increase in patient information sharing among doctors impacts healthcare costs. To this end, we explore this impact through two mechanisms – the informative role of patient health conditions and the cross-monitoring role against doctor-driven induced healthcare demands. We utilize a unique policy intervention (a drug utilization review) introduced in 2009 in Korea that enables doctors to share outpatients’ prescription histories. Using difference-in-differences, we found that, when patient information is improved, there is a reduction in pharmaceutical spending. This result is especially true for those patients who have relatively weak information-sharing capabilities. Using data on the amount of antibiotics prescribed for the common cold, we find that a cross-monitoring of prescriptions among doctors reduces the amount of unnecessary prescriptions and thus healthcare spending.

Date: 2020
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DOI: 10.1080/00036846.2020.1713984

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