Measuring Prices in Health Care Markets Using Commercial Claims Data.

ABSTRACT: To compare methods of price measurement in health care markets.Truven Health Analytics MarketScan commercial claims.We constructed medical prices indices using three approaches: (1) a "sentinel" service approach based on a single common service in a specific clinical domain, (2) a market basket approach, and (3) a spending decomposition approach. We constructed indices at the Metropolitan Statistical Area level and estimated correlations between and within them.Price indices using a spending decomposition approach were strongly and positively correlated with indices constructed from broad market baskets of common services (r > 0.95). Prices of single common services exhibited weak to moderate correlations with each other and other measures.Market-level price measures that reflect broad sets of services are likely to rank markets similarly. Price indices relying on individual sentinel services may be more appropriate for examining specialty- or service-specific drivers of prices.

SUBMITTER: Neprash HT 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4693848 | biostudies-literature | 2015 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature