Dataset Information

Cost of Surgical Care at Public Sector District Hospitals in India: Implications for Universal Health Coverage and Publicly Financed Health Insurance Schemes.

ABSTRACT:

Background

In low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), provisioning for surgical care is a public health priority. Ayushman Bharat Pradhan Mantri-Jan Aarogya Yojana (AB PM-JAY) is India's largest national insurance scheme providing free surgical and medical care. In this paper, we present the costs of surgical health benefit packages (HBPs) for secondary care in public district hospitals.

Methods

The costs were estimated using mixed (top-down and bottom-up) micro-costing methods. In phase II of the Costing of Health Services in India (CHSI) study, data were collected from a sample of 27 district hospitals from nine states of India. The district hospitals were selected using stratified random sampling based on the district's composite development score. We estimated unit costs for individual services-outpatient (OP) visit, per bed-day in inpatient (IP) and intensive care unit (ICU) stays, and surgical procedures. Together, this was used to estimate the cost of 250 AB PM-JAY HBPs.

Results

At the current level of utilization, the mean cost per OP consultation varied from US$4.10 to US$2.60 among different surgical specialities. The mean unit cost per IP bed-day ranged from US$13.40 to US$35.60. For the ICU, the mean unit cost per bed-day was US$74. Further, the unit cost of HBPs varied from US$564 for bone tumour excision to US$49 for lid tear repair.

Conclusions

Data on the cost of delivering surgical care at the level of district hospitals is of critical value for evidence-based policymaking, price-setting for surgical care and planning to strengthen the availability of high quality and cost-effective surgical care in district hospitals.

SUBMITTER: Singh MP

PROVIDER: S-EPMC9216290 | biostudies-literature | 2022 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

ACCESS DATA

Publications

Cost of Surgical Care at Public Sector District Hospitals in India: Implications for Universal Health Coverage and Publicly Financed Health Insurance Schemes.

Singh Maninder Pal MP Prinja Shankar S Rajsekar Kavitha K Gedam Praveen P Aggarwal Vipul V Sachin Oshima O Naik Jyotsna J Agarwal Ajai A Kumar Sanjay S Sinha Setu S Singh Varsha V Patel Prakash P Patel Amit C AC Joshi Rajendra R Hazra Avijit A Misra Raghunath R Mehrotra Divya D Biswal Sashi Bhusan SB Panigrahy Ankita A Gaur Kusum Lata KL Pankaj Jai Prakash JP Sharma Dharmesh Kumar DK Madhavi Kondeti K Madhusudana Pulaganti P Narayanasamy K K Chitra A A Velhal Gajanan D GD Bhondve Amit S AS Bahl Rakesh R Sachdeva Amit A Kaur Sharminder S Nagar Anu A Bhargava Balram B

PharmacoEconomics - open 20220622 5

<h4>Background</h4>In low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), provisioning for surgical care is a public health priority. Ayushman Bharat Pradhan Mantri-Jan Aarogya Yojana (AB PM-JAY) is India's largest national insurance scheme providing free surgical and medical care. In this paper, we present the costs of surgical health benefit packages (HBPs) for secondary care in public district hospitals.<h4>Methods</h4>The costs were estimated using mixed (top-down and bottom-up) micro-costing methods. ...[more]

PMID: 35733075

Similar Datasets

Project description:Several publicly financed health insurance schemes have been launched in India with the aim of providing universalizing health coverage (UHC). In this paper, we report the impact of publicly financed health insurance schemes on health service utilization, out-of-pocket (OOP) expenditure, financial risk protection and health status. Empirical research studies focussing on the impact or evaluation of publicly financed health insurance schemes in India were searched on PubMed, Google scholar, Ovid, Scopus, Embase and relevant websites. The studies were selected based on two stage screening PRISMA guidelines in which two researchers independently assessed the suitability and quality of the studies. The studies included in the review were divided into two groups i.e., with and without a comparison group. To assess the impact on utilization, OOP expenditure and health indicators, only the studies with a comparison group were reviewed. Out of 1265 articles screened after initial search, 43 studies were found eligible and reviewed in full text, finally yielding 14 studies which had a comparator group in their evaluation design. All the studies (n-7) focussing on utilization showed a positive effect in terms of increase in the consumption of health services with introduction of health insurance. About 70% studies (n-5) studies with a strong design and assessing financial risk protection showed no impact in reduction of OOP expenditures, while remaining 30% of evaluations (n-2), which particularly evaluated state sponsored health insurance schemes, reported a decline in OOP expenditure among the enrolled households. One study which evaluated impact on health outcome showed reduction in mortality among enrolled as compared to non-enrolled households, from conditions covered by the insurance scheme. While utilization of healthcare did improve among those enrolled in the scheme, there is no clear evidence yet to suggest that these have resulted in reduced OOP expenditures or higher financial risk protection.

Project description:BackgroundPublicly Funded Health Insurance Schemes (PFHIS) are intended to play a role in achieving Universal Health Coverage (UHC). In countries like India, PFHISs have low penetrance and provide limited coverage of services and of family members within households, which can mean that women lose out. Gender inequities in relation to financial risk protection are understudied. Given the emphasis being placed on achieving UHC for all in India, this paper examined intersecting gender inequalities and changes in PFHIS coverage in southern India, where its penetrance is greater and of longer duration.Data and methodsThis study used the fourth (NFHS-4, 2015-16) and fifth (NFHS-5, 2019-21) rounds of India's National Family Health Survey for five southern states: namely, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, and Telangana. The World Health Organization's Health Equity Assessment Toolkit (HEAT) Plus and Stata were used to analyse PFHIS coverage disaggregated by seven dimensions of inequality. Ratios and differences for binary dimensions; Between Group Variance and Theil Index for unordered dimensions; Absolute and Relative Concentration Index (RCI) for ordered dimensions were computed separately for women and men.ResultsOverall, PFHIS coverage increased significantly (p < 0.001) among women and men in Andhra Pradesh, and Kerala from NFHS-4 to NFHS-5. Overall, men had higher PFHIS coverage than women, especially in Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, and Telangana in both surveys. In both absolute and relative terms, PFHIS coverage was concentrated among older women and men across all states; age-related inequalities were higher among women than men in both surveys in Andhra Pradesh, Kerala, and Telengana. The magnitude of education-related inequalities was twice as high as among women in Telangana (RCINFHS-4: -12.23; RCINFHS-5: -9.98) and Andhra Pradesh (RCINFHS-4: -8.05; RCINFHS-5: -7.84) as compared to men in Telangana (RCINFHS-4: -5.58; RCINFHS-5: -2.30) and Andhra Pradesh (RCINFHS-4: -4.40; RCINFHS-5: -3.12) and these inequalities remained in NFHS-5, suggesting that lower education level women had greater coverage. In the latter survey, a high magnitude of wealth-related inequality was observed in women (RCINFHS-4: -15.78; RCINFHS-5: -14.36) and men (RCINFHS-4: -20.42; RCINFHS-5: -13.84) belonging to Kerala, whereas this inequality has decreased from NFHS-4 to NFHS-5., again suggestive of greater coverage among poorer populations. Caste-related inequalities were higher in women than men in both surveys, the magnitude of inequalities decreased between 2015-16 and 2019-20.ConclusionsWe found gender inequalities in self-reported enrolment in southern states with long-standing PFHIS. Inequalities favoured the poor, uneducated and elderly, which is to some extend desirable when rolling out a PFHIS intended for harder to reach populations. However, religion and caste-based inequalities, while reducing, were still prevalent among women. If PFHIS are to truly offer financial risk protection, they must address the intersecting marginalization faced by women and men, while meeting eventual goals of risk pooling, indicated by high coverage and low inequality across population sub-groups.

Project description:Private sector plays an import role in health service provision, therefore the engagement of private health facilities is important for ensuring access to health services. In Thailand, two of the three public health insurance schemes, Universal Coverage Scheme and Social Health Insurance, contract with private health facilities to fill gaps of public providers for the provision of health services under Universal Health Coverage. The National Health Security Office (NHSO) and Social Security Office (SSO), which manage the schemes respectively, have designed their own contractual agreements for private facilities. We aim to understand the current situation of contracting private health facilities within UHC of the two purchasing agencies. This qualitative descriptive case study was conducted through document review and in-depth interviews with key informants to understand how they contract private primary care facilities, service types, duration of contract, standard and quality requirement and renewal and termination of contracts. Private providers make a small contribution to the service provision in Thailand as a whole but they are important actors in Bangkok. The current approaches used by two purchasers are not adequate in engaging private sector to fill the gap of public provision in urban cities. One important reason is that large private hospitals do not find public contracts financially attractive. NHSO classifies contracts into 3 categories: main contracting units, primary care units, and referral units; while SSO only contracts main contracting units. Both allows subcontracting by the main contractors. Contractual agreements are effective in ensuring mandatory infrastructure and quality standards. Both purchasers have established technical capacities to enforce quality monitoring and financial compliance although there remains room for improvement especially on identifying fraud and taking legal actions. Contracting private healthcare facilities can fill the gap of public healthcare facilities, especially in urban settings. Purchasers need to balance the right level of incentives and accountability measures to ensure access to quality of care. In contracting private-for-profit providers, strong regulatory enforcement and auditing capacities are necessary. Further studies may explore various aspects contracting outcomes including access, equity, quality and efficiency impacts.

Project description:BackgroundReducing patient expenditure and expanding healthcare access through private sector hospitals is widely touted strategy for governments to achieve Universal Health Care, including in India. However, private sector engagement in India's publicly funded health insurance schemes (PFHIS) remains low and is uneven across geographies and by hospitals size. This paper examines challenges to achieving effective private sector engagement in PFHIS by analysing private sector participation and exploring diverse stakeholder perspectives.MethodsThis case study used sequential mixed methods design and was conducted in 2023-24 in Maharashtra, India. We combined quantitative analysis of the geographic distribution of empanelled private hospitals (993 across Maharashtra's 36 districts) and qualitative interviews (n = 16) with diverse stakeholders to understand why some facilities do not engage. The analysis was guided by our framework on private sector engagement that examined policy factors, hospital level factors and operational factors.ResultsOnly 13% of private hospitals were empanelled in Maharashtra's PFHIS, with higher empanelment in urban areas and among small and medium sized hospitals; rural areas had few empanelled hospitals and few large private hospitals participated. Districts with few empanelled private hospitals had lower overall hospitalization rates, suggesting persistent unmet population need for affordable hospitals. Low private sector engagement was driven by multiple factors: at the policy level, insufficient state budgets, low reimbursement rates, fixed scheme packages, strict empanelment criteria, complex claims processes, and delayed reimbursements; at the hospital level, economic non-viability, concerns about patient load and profile, and limited administrative capacities; and at the operational level, inadequate monitoring mechanisms for PFHIS and empanelled hospitals, gaps in the empanelment process, and delays in patient pre-authorization and claims processing.ConclusionThis study enhances understanding of private sector engagement challenges and provides insights for improving PFHIS and UHC in India. The framework developed can also be applied beyond India to assess the complexities of intent, capacity, and interactions between private and public actors in PFHIS. To create an enabling environment for private sector engagement and achieve the scheme's objectives, the state could increase reimbursement rates, implement responsive grievance redressal, regulate private hospitals, and improve governance processes. A two-fold strategy of strengthening the public health system and engaging with regulated private hospitals could enhance the scheme's effectiveness.

Project description:To facilitate the drive towards Universal Health Coverage (UHC) several countries in West Africa have adopted National Health Insurance (NHI) schemes to finance health services. However, safeguarding insured populations against catastrophic health expenditure (CHE) and impoverishment due to health spending still remains a challenge. This study aims to describe the extent of financial risk protection among households enrolled under NHI schemes in West Africa and summarize potential learnings. We conducted a systematic review following the PRISMA guidelines. We searched for observational studies published in English between 2005 and 2022 on the following databases: PubMed/Medline, Web of Science, CINAHL, Embase and Google Scholar. We assessed the study quality using the Joanna Briggs Institute (JBI) critical appraisal checklist. Two independent reviewers assessed the studies for inclusion, extracted data and conducted quality assessment. We presented our findings as thematic synthesis for qualitative data and Synthesis Without Meta-analysis (SWiM) for quantitative data. We published the study protocol in PROSPERO with ID CRD42022338574. Nine articles were eligible for inclusion, comprising eight cross-sectional studies and one retrospective cohort study published between 2011 and 2021 in Ghana (n = 8) and Nigeria (n = 1). While two-thirds of the studies reported a positive (protective) effect of NHI enrollment on CHE at different thresholds, almost all of the studies (n = 8) reported some proportion of insured households still encountered CHE with one-third reporting more than 50% incurring CHE. Although insured households seemed better protected against CHE and impoverishment compared to uninsured households, gaps in the current NHI design contributed to financial burden among insured populations. To enhance financial risk protection among insured households and advance the drive towards UHC, West African governments should consider investing more in NHI research, implementing nationwide compulsory NHI programmes and establishing multinational subregional collaborations to co-design sustainable context-specific NHI systems based on solidarity, equity and fair financial contribution.

Project description:ObjectivesTo analyse the relationship between health need, insurance coverage, health service availability, service use, insurance claims and out-of-pocket spending on health across Indonesia.DesignSecondary analysis of nationally representative quantitative data. We merged four national data sets: the National Socioeconomic Survey 2018, National Census of Villages 2018, Population Health Development Index 2018 and National Insurance Records to end 2017. Descriptive analysis and linear regression were performed.SettingIndonesia has one of the world's largest single-payer national health insurance schemes. Data are individual and district level; all are representative for each of the country's 514 districts.ParticipantsAnonymised secondary data from 1 131 825 individual records in the National Socioeconomic Survey and 83 931 village records in the village census. Aggregate data for 220 million insured citizens.Primary outcome measuresHealth service use and out-of-pocket payments, by health need, insurance status and service availability. Secondary outcome: insurance claims.ResultsSelf-reported national health insurance registration (60.6%) is about 10% lower compared with the insurer's report (71.1%). Insurance coverage is highest in poorer areas, where service provision, and thus service use and health spending, are lowest. Inpatient use is higher among the insured than the uninsured (OR 2.35, 95% CI 2.27 to 2.42), controlling for health need and access), and poorer patients are most likely to report free inpatient care (53% in wealth quintile 1 vs 41% in Q5). Insured patients spend US$ 3.14 more on hospitalisation than the uninsured (95% CI 1.98 to 4.31), but the difference disappears when controlled for wealth. Lack of services is a major constraint on service use, insurance claims and out-of-pocket spending.ConclusionsThe Indonesian public insurance system protects many inpatients, especially the poorest, from excessive spending. However, others, especially in Eastern Indonesia cannot benefit because few services are available. To achieve health equity, the Indonesian government needs to address supply side constraints and reduce structural underfunding.

Dataset Information

Cost of Surgical Care at Public Sector District Hospitals in India: Implications for Universal Health Coverage and Publicly Financed Health Insurance Schemes.

Background

Methods

Results

Conclusions

Publications

Cost of Surgical Care at Public Sector District Hospitals in India: Implications for Universal Health Coverage and Publicly Financed Health Insurance Schemes.

Similar Datasets

OmicsDI is part of the ELIXIR infrastructure

Tweets