Health Care Use And Spending Patterns Vary By Wage Level In Employer-Sponsored Plans.
Employees face an increasing financial burden for health services as health care costs increase relative to earnings. Yet little is known about health care utilization patterns relative to employee wages. To better understand this association and the resulting implications, we examined patterns of h...
| Published in: | Health Affairs Vol. 36; no. 2; pp. 250 - 258 |
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| Main Authors: | , , , |
| Format: | research tables/charts Journal Article |
| Published: |
Health Affairs Publishing, LLC
Feb2017
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| Online Access: | View this record in EBSCOhost |
| fields | @attributes: recordID: 1 pdfLink: plink: https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=ccm&AN=121154550&site=ehost-live header: @attributes: shortDbName: ccm uiTerm: 121154550 longDbName: CINAHL Complete uiTag: AN controlInfo: bkinfo: dissinfo: jinfo: jid: 02782715 HAF jtl: Health Affairs issn: 02782715 maglogo: N pubinfo: dt: Feb2017 vid: 36 iid: 2 pid: 1453 pub: Health Affairs Publishing, LLC place: Washington, District of Columbia artinfo: ui: 121154550 121154550 121154550 10.1377/hlthaff.2016.1147 121154550 ppf: 250 ppct: 8 formats: tig: atl: Health Care Use And Spending Patterns Vary By Wage Level In Employer-Sponsored Plans. aug: au: Sherman, Bruce W. Gibson, Teresa B. Lynch, Wendy D. Addy, Carol affil: Medical director, population health management at Conduent HR Services, Cleveland, Ohio sug: subj: Patient Care Plans Salaries and Fringe Benefits Health Care Costs Health Resource Utilization Employment Human Health Benefit Plans, Employee Health Insurance Exchanges Healthcare Disparities Health Status Disparities Patient Admission Emergency Service Utilization Socioeconomic Factors Insurance Coverage Logistic Regression Male Female Adolescence Young Adult Adult Middle Age Age Factors Sex Factors Scales Cross Sectional Studies Preventive Health Care Funding Source Adolescent: 13-18 years Adult: 19-44 years Middle Aged: 45-64 years Male Female ab: Employees face an increasing financial burden for health services as health care costs increase relative to earnings. Yet little is known about health care utilization patterns relative to employee wages. To better understand this association and the resulting implications, we examined patterns of health care use and spending by wage category during 2014 among 42,936 employees of four self-insured employers enrolled in a private health insurance exchange. When demographics and other characteristics were controlled for, employees in the lowest-wage group had half the usage of preventive care (19 percent versus 38 percent), nearly twice the hospital admission rate (31 individuals per 1,000 versus 17 per 1,000), more than four times the rate of avoidable admissions (4.3 individuals per 1,000 versus 0.9 per 1,000), and more than three times the rate of emergency department visits (370 individuals per 1,000 versus 120 per 1,000) relative to top-wage-group earners. Annual total health care spending per patient was highest in both the lowest-wage ($4,835) and highest-wage ($5,074) categories relative to the middle two wage groups ($3,952 and $3,987, respectively). These findings provide new insights about wage-associated variations in health care use and spending in employer-sponsored plans. For policy makers, these findings can inform employer benefit design strategies and research priorities, to encourage effective use of health care services. pubtype: Academic Journal doctype: research tables/charts Journal Article ougenre: Article language: English refInfo: holdings: @attributes: islocal: N |
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