Research from Andalas University Has Provided New Study Findings on Public Health (Incidence of moral hazards among health care providers in the implementation of social health insurance toward universal health coverage: evidence from rural …): Health and Medicine – Public Health

2023 SEP 06 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Insurance Daily News -- Investigators discuss new findings in public health. According to news originating from Padang, Indonesia, by NewsRx correspondents, research stated, “ObjectiveTo identify the incidence of moral hazards among health care providers and its determinant factors in the implementation of national health insurance in Indonesia. MethodsData were derived from 360 inpatient medical records from six types C public and private hospitals in an Indonesian rural province.”

Our news correspondents obtained a quote from the research from Andalas University: “These data were accumulated from inpatient medical records from four major disciplines: medicine, surgery, obstetrics and gynecology, and pediatrics. The dependent variable was provider moral hazards, which included indicators of up-coding, readmission, and unnecessary admission. The independent variables are Physicians’ characteristics (age, gender, and specialization), coders’ characteristics (age, gender, education level, number of training, and length of service), and patients’ characteristics (age, birth weight, length of stay, the discharge status, and the severity of patient’s illness). We use logistic regression to investigate the determinants of moral hazard. ResultsWe found that the incidences of possible unnecessary admissions, up-coding, and readmissions were 17.8%, 11.9%, and 2.8%, respectively. Senior physicians, medical specialists, coders with shorter lengths of service, and patients with longer lengths of stay had a significant relationship with the incidence of moral hazard. ConclusionUnnecessary admission is the most common form of a provider’s moral hazard.”

According to the news reporters, the research concluded: “The characteristics of physicians and coders significantly contribute to the incidence of moral hazard. Hospitals should implement reward and punishment systems for doctors and coders in order to control moral hazards among the providers.”

For more information on this research see: Incidence of moral hazards among health care providers in the implementation of social health insurance toward universal health coverage: evidence from rural province hospitals in Indonesia. Frontiers in Public Health, 2023,11. (Frontiers in Public Health - http://journal.frontiersin.org/journal/public-health). The publisher for Frontiers in Public Health is Frontiers Media S.A.

A free version of this journal article is available at https://doi.org/10.3389/fpubh.2023.1147709.

Our news editors report that more information may be obtained by contacting Syafrawati Syafrawati, Faculty of Medicine, Andalas University, Padang, Indonesia. Additional authors for this research include Rizanda Machmud, Syed Mohamed Aljunid, Rima Semiarty.

(Our reports deliver fact-based news of research and discoveries from around the world.)