• Health Policy and Management
• /
• v.6 no.2
• /
• pp.14-42
• /
• 1996

On rationale for government intervention is the failure of competition in the market. Health care markets are characterized by such unique aspects as information asymmetry, prevalence of insurance, and cost-increasing competition based on the adoption of costly medical technology. Therefore, government policy to guarantee a sufficient number of providers in markets may not lead to socially beneficisal outcomes such as higher quantity and lower price. This paper examines the unique nature of health services and its implications for competition, the evidence that competition may not reduce health care ex[enditures, and policy tools that government can use to encourage competition which contributes to supporting a sustainable health care system.

• Pediatric Gastroenterology, Hepatology & Nutrition
• /
• v.14 no.2
• /
• pp.137-140
• /
• 2011

Research and development (R&D) is very important to acquire new knowledge in various fields. The significance of public R&D is also increasing, especially related to health policy making, establishing basic databases, and enhancing basic and clinical science. The total budget of general public R&D in Korea was approximately ten billon US Dollars in 2008, but the proportion of health care research was just below 10%. In private sectors, it was three times the amount allocated to the public budget. In this article, recent trends in public R&D in Korea, especially related to health care policy and biotechnology are summarized. A brief overview of the application process for a specific policy fund is also described for early-stage researchers in these fields.

• Health Policy and Management
• /
• v.9 no.1
• /
• pp.72-109
• /
• 1999

This study is conducted to investigate the current status on the utilization of health care and plan for solving this problem. The claims data of the fiscal tear 1995 obtained from the regional health insurance society are used for the study. The main findings of the study are summarized as follows. Indexes(The Extremal Quotient(EQ), coefficients of variance(CV's))which represent the regional difference in the admission rate of the tertiary medical diagnosis group report that there is difference in quantity and quality of utilization of health care. The admission rate is lower in the big city areas, Kyoungkido, Kangwondo and Chunlapukdo. Even after age-sex adjustment, the admission rate is still low in Kangwondo, Chunlapukdo and Kyoungsangpukdo. The big city areas tend to have higher rates in the expenses per claim, hospital days per claim, and daily expenses but the rates are still low in some area in Kangwondo, Chunlanamdo and Kyoungsangpukdo. This result remains as same after age-sex adjustment. There is a large regional difference in average utilization rate for the tertiary hospital of the tertiary medical diagnosis group: 57.2%(SD 11.53). The utilization rates for the tertiary hospital in their large catchment area are 96.34%, 83.19% and 73.22% in each Kyoungin, Kyoungnam and Kyoungpuk areas whereas it is lower in a Chungpuk and Chungnam areas. The regional differences of health care utilization of the tertiary medical diagnosis group gave some relationships with their geographical characteristics such as socio-economic characteristics and supply factors of medical services. It is important that many medical policies should be developed in order to minimize and balance out the regional differences of health care utilization. The service allocation policy should include the reconstruction of manpower policy, developing the resource allocating formula, finding the self-sufficient catchment area and reforcing of public health services. Moreover, in order to achieve the balanced development by region, they should investigate and consider each county's microscopic properties under the consistent macrocopic policy. The further studies to find causes of regional difference are needed.

• Research in Community and Public Health Nursing
• /
• v.22 no.1
• /
• pp.33-44
• /
• 2011

Purpose: This study examined the characteristics and service utilization of home nursing care beneficiaries under the Korean Long-Term Care Insurance (LTCI). Methods: We used assessment data and claim data of National Health Insurance Corporation from July to August 2008. Data were composed of subjects who were the beneficiaries of home nursing care. Results; A total of 634 subjects were analyzed. Of the subjects, 57.1% were 75 years and over. The average score of nursing care need was only 0.71 and the percentage of those whose nursing care need score was zero was 58.0%. More than half of the subjects had partially dependent musculoskeletal conditions, and 75.5% had two or more comorbidities. A third of them usedonly home nursing care, and another third used both home nursing care and general home care at the same time. Those who needed sore care used the largest home nursing care benefits. Conclusion: Home nursing care of LTCI performs community-based healthcare services under LTCI. Throughout the past two years, however, it has not been active. Understanding the characteristics of its users is important in order to develop effective strategies for activating home nursing care.

• Health Policy and Management
• /
• v.11 no.4
• /
• pp.21-37
• /
• 2001

The purpose of this study is to examine internet agent of IT(Information Technology) in health care industry Since IT is essential for corporate strategy in service management, this section examines IT in health care service, especially from the view of 'Agent Technology' that has been recently issued. Intelligent agent is a new paradigm for developing software applications. More than this, agent-based computing has been hailed as 'the next significant break-through in software development' and 'the new revolution in software'. And health care service is a non-mechanic, human-based service. This paper reviewed what possible suggestions or advices can be made to the health care service. Since many health care services using internet have been attempted over the recent years, this study will hopefully be able to come up with good suggestions from many aspects. Thus, information inequality between producer(physician) and consumer(patient) in health care service will be decreased through the introduction of agent technology.

• Health Policy and Management
• /
• v.32 no.2
• /
• pp.123-124
• /
• 2022

With the inauguration of a new government, expectations for policy changes are also rising. In the hope that this will serve as an opportunity to improve health care policy, I would like to outline the principles strategies. First, considering the growing socioeconomic impact of the health care sector, the government's policy priorities should be notably increased compared to the past. Second, policy improvement measures based on evidence should be sought instead of dwelling on presidential pledges. While easing regulations, we should improve the quality of regulatory approaches. Therefore, it is a time when efforts are needed to strengthen the stability of policies in response to economic crises.

• Journal of Preventive Medicine and Public Health
• /
• v.50 no.1
• /
• pp.29-37
• /
• 2017

Objectives: The accurate measurement of geographic patterns of health care utilization is a prerequisite for the study of geographic variations in health care utilization. While several measures have been developed to measure how accurately geographic units reflect the health care utilization patterns of residents, they have been only applied to hospitalization and need further evaluation. This study aimed to evaluate geographic indices describing health care utilization. Methods: We measured the utilization rate and four health care utilization indices (localization index, outflow index, inflow index, and net patient flow) for eight major procedures (coronary artery bypass graft surgery, percutaneous transluminal coronary angioplasty, surgery after hip fracture, knee replacement surgery, caesarean sections, hysterectomy, computed tomography scans, and magnetic resonance imaging scans) according to three levels of geographic units in Korea. Data were obtained from the National Health Insurance database in Korea. We evaluated the associations among the health care utilization indices and the utilization rates. Results: In higher-level geographic units, the localization index tended to be high, while the inflow index and outflow index were lower. The indices showed different patterns depending on the procedure. A strong negative correlation between the localization index and the outflow index was observed for all procedures. Net patient flow showed a moderate positive correlation with the localization index and the inflow index. Conclusions: Health care utilization indices can be used as a proxy to describe the utilization pattern of a procedure in a geographic unit.

• Health Policy and Management
• /
• v.27 no.1
• /
• pp.3-17
• /
• 2017

In the traditional medical field, the patient was a person to receive protection from the doctor because there are vertical relationship between the patient and the doctor. But in modern medical field, patients change their role to health-care consumer to be guaranteed their rights more actively. This study compare patient's rights in doctor's vocational ethics and patient's rights in law, consumer rights. This study analyzes what is type of law-relationship between patients and doctor and how can they act health-care as health-care consumer.

• Health Policy and Management
• /
• v.32 no.1
• /
• pp.29-44
• /
• 2022

Background: This study was conducted to analyze the impact of having a usual source of care on health behaviors of the middle aged and the elderly, in order to investigate the potential effect of enhancing primary health care in a Korean context. Methods: This study constructed a balanced panel of middle-aged and elderly samples using the Korea Health Panel 2016-2018, and fixed-effect models were used to analyze the data. Results: Among three sets of dependent variables (physical activity, smoking, drinking), statistically significant results were found only in physical activity. Subgroup analysis showed that this effect was not observed in the late elderly (aged 75 and older) and those without chronic diseases. Conclusion: Results of the study implied that enhancing primary health care among middle age and the elderly may have an effect on improving health behaviors. Moving forward to person-centered primary health care from disease-focused primary health care should be considered in high-risk groups such as the middle aged and the elderly with chronic diseases.

• Health Policy and Management
• /
• v.29 no.3
• /
• pp.262-276
• /
• 2019

Background: The most important thing to strengthen primary care is to prove that the continuity of primary care is an essential area for good health outcomes. The purpose of this study is to analyze the effect of outpatient continuity of primary care on the hospitalization experience of diabetes mellitus in new diabetic patients. Methods: Using the Korean National Health Insurance Service national sample cohort (NHIS-NSC 2011-2015) data, 3,391 new diabetic patients in 2012 were selected for the study. Multiple logistic regression was performed to investigate the effect of outpatient continuity of primary care on hospitalization in new diabetic patients. Results: The outpatient continuity of primary care in new diabetic patients was measured by the continuity of care index, which showed that 69.4% (n=2,352) were high level and 30.6% (n=1,039) were low level. Patients who had high continuity of primary care at the early stage of diabetes diagnosis showed 3.49 times more likely to maintain high continuity of primary care in the second year (95% confidence interval [CI], 2.72-4.49). Patients with low continuity of primary care for 2 years from the initial diagnosis of diabetes were 2.56 times more likely to be hospitalized due to diabetes than those who did not (95% CI, 1.55-4.25). Conclusion: This study identified the need for policies to increase the continuity of primary care for new diabetic patients and could contribute to lowering the admission rate of diabetic patients if the policy for this would work effectively.