Research Study Findings from Capital Medical University Update Understanding of Heart Disease (Impact of capitation prepayment on the medical expenses and health service utilization of patients with coronary heart disease: a community policy …): Heart Disorders and Diseases – Heart Disease

Health Policy and Law Daily

2023 NOV 28 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Health Policy and Law Daily -- Research findings on heart disease are discussed in a new report. According to news reporting out of Capital Medical University by NewsRx editors, research stated, “Medical costs have been rising rapidly in recent years, and China is controlling medical costs from the perspective of health insurance payments. To explore the impact of the capitation prepayment method on medical expenses and health service utilization of coronary heart disease (CHD) patients, which provides a scientific basis for further improvement of the payment approach.”

Funders for this research include The National Natural Science Foundation of China.

The news editors obtained a quote from the research from Capital Medical University: “The diagnosis records of visits for CHD in the database from 2014 to 2016 (April to December each year) were selected, and two townships were randomly selected as the pilot and control groups. Propensity score matching (PSM) and difference-in-difference (DID) model were used to assess changes in outpatient and inpatient expenses and health service utilization among CHD patients after the implementation of the capitation prepayment policy. There were eventually 3,900 outpatients and 664 inpatients enrolled in this study after PSM. The DID model showed that in the first year of implementing the reform, total outpatient expenses decreased by CNY 13.953, drug expenses decreased by CNY 11.289, as well as Medicare payments decreased by CNY 8.707 in the pilot group compared to the control group. In the second year of implementing the reform, compared with the control group, the pilot group had a reduction of CNY 3.123 in other expenses, and a reduction of CNY 6.841 in Medicare payments. There was no significant change in inpatient expenses in the pilot group compared to the control group, but there was an increase of 0.829 visits to rural medical institutions, and an increase of 0.750 visits within the county for inpatients.”

According to the news editors, the research concluded: “The capitation prepayment method has been effective in controlling the outpatient expenses of CHD patients, as well as improving the medical service capacity of medical institutions within the Medical Community, and increasing the rate of inside county visits for inpatients.”

For more information on this research see: Impact of capitation prepayment on the medical expenses and health service utilization of patients with coronary heart disease: a community policy intervention program in a county in China. BMC Public Health, 2023,23(1):1-14. (BMC Public Health - http://bmcpublichealth.biomedcentral.com). The publisher for BMC Public Health is BMC.

A free version of this journal article is available at https://doi.org/10.1186/s12889-023-17161-x.

Our news journalists report that additional information may be obtained by contacting Jincao Yan, School of Public Health, Capital Medical University. Additional authors for this research include Yunke Shi, Jiani Zhang, Siwei Chen, Xinran Huo, Yue Shen, Ning Zhang.