Advanced Search
MyIDEAS: Login

Vertical and horizontal aspects of socio-economic inequity in general practitioner contacts in Scotland

Contents:

Author Info

  • Matthew Sutton

    (Department of General Practice, University of Glasgow, UK)

Registered author(s):

    Abstract

    Health status varies across socio-economic groups and health status is generally assumed to predict health care needs. Therefore the need for health care varies across socio-economic groups, and studies of equity in the distribution of health care between socio-economic groups must compare levels of utilisation with levels of need. Economic studies of equity in health care generally assume that health care needs can be derived from the current health-health care relationship. They therefore do not consider whether the current health-health care relationship is (vertically) equitable and the focus is restricted to horizontal inequity. This paper proposes a framework for incorporating the implications of vertical inequity for the socio-economic distribution of health care. An alternative to the current health-health care relationship is proposed using a restriction on the health-elasticity of health care. The health-elasticity of general practitioner contacts in Scotland is found to be generally negative, but positive at low levels of health status. Pro-rich estimates of horizontal inequity and vertical inequity are obtained but neither is statistically significant. Further analysis demonstrates that the magnitude of vertical inequity in health care may be larger than horizontal inequity. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

    Download Info

    If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the proper application to view it first. In case of further problems read the IDEAS help page. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS site. Please be patient as the files may be large.
    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1002/hec.752
    File Function: Link to full text; subscription required
    Download Restriction: no

    Bibliographic Info

    Article provided by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. in its journal Health Economics.

    Volume (Year): 11 (2002)
    Issue (Month): 6 ()
    Pages: 537-549

    as in new window
    Handle: RePEc:wly:hlthec:v:11:y:2002:i:6:p:537-549

    Contact details of provider:
    Web page: http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/cgi-bin/jhome/5749

    Related research

    Keywords:

    References

    References listed on IDEAS
    Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
    as in new window
    1. Arrow, Kenneth J, 1971. "A Utilitarian Approach to the Concept of Equality in Public Expenditure," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, MIT Press, vol. 85(3), pages 409-15, August.
    2. van Doorslaer, Eddy & Wagstaff, Adam & van der Burg, Hattem & Christiansen, Terkel & De Graeve, Diana & Duchesne, Inge & Gerdtham, Ulf-G & Gerfin, Michael & Geurts, Jose & Gross, Lorna, 2000. "Equity in the delivery of health care in Europe and the US," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 19(5), pages 553-583, September.
    3. O'Donnell, Owen & Propper, Carol, 1991. "Equity and the distribution of U.K. National Health Service resources," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 10(2), pages 247-249, July.
    4. Matthew Sutton & Peter Lock, 2000. "Regional differences in health care delivery: implications for a national resource allocation formula," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 9(6), pages 547-559.
    5. Le Grand, Julian, 1991. "The distribution of health care revisited: A commentary on Wagstaff, van Doorslaer and Paci, and O'Donnell and Propper," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 10(2), pages 239-245, July.
    6. Doorslaer, Eddy van & Jones, Andrew M., 2003. "Inequalities in self-reported health: validation of a new approach to measurement," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 22(1), pages 61-87, January.
    7. Wagstaff, Adam & van Doorslaer, Eddy & Paci, Pierella, 1991. "On the measurement of horizontal inequity in the delivery of health care," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 10(2), pages 169-205, July.
    8. Mooney, Gavin & Hall, Jane & Donaldson, Cam & Gerard, Karen, 1991. "Utilisation as a measure of equity: weighing heat?," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 10(4), pages 475-480.
    9. Wagstaff, Adam & van Doorslaer, Eddy & Paci, Pierella, 1991. "Horizontal equity in the delivery of health care," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 10(2), pages 251-256, July.
    10. Culyer, A. J. & Wagstaff, Adam, 1993. "Equity and equality in health and health care," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 12(4), pages 431-457, December.
    11. Le Grand, Julian, 1978. "The Distribution of Public Expenditure: The Case of Health Care," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 45(178), pages 125-42, May.
    12. Kakwani, Nanak & Wagstaff, Adam & van Doorslaer, Eddy, 1997. "Socioeconomic inequalities in health: Measurement, computation, and statistical inference," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 77(1), pages 87-103, March.
    13. van Doorslaer, Eddy & Wagstaff, Adam & Bleichrodt, Han & Calonge, Samuel & Gerdtham, Ulf-G. & Gerfin, Michael & Geurts, Jose & Gross, Lorna & Hakkinen, Unto & Leu, Robert E., 1997. "Income-related inequalities in health: some international comparisons," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 16(1), pages 93-112, February.
    14. Hugh Gravelle, . "Measuring income related inequality in health and health care: the partial concentration index with direct and indirect standardisation," Discussion Papers 01/17, Department of Economics, University of York.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as in new window

    Cited by:
    1. FLEURBAEY, Marc & SCHOKKAERT, Erik, 2007. "Unfair inequalities in health and health care," CORE Discussion Papers 2007090, Université catholique de Louvain, Center for Operations Research and Econometrics (CORE).
    2. Teresa Bago d'Uva & Andrew M. Jones & Eddy van Doorslaer, 2007. "Measurement of Horizontal Inequity in Health Care Utilisation using European Panel Data," Tinbergen Institute Discussion Papers 07-059/3, Tinbergen Institute.
    3. Bago d'Uva, Teresa & Jones, Andrew M. & van Doorslaer, Eddy, 2009. "Measurement of horizontal inequity in health care utilisation using European panel data," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 28(2), pages 280-289, March.
    4. FLEURBAEY, Marc & SCHOKKAERT, Erik, 2011. "Equity in health and health care," CORE Discussion Papers 2011026, Université catholique de Louvain, Center for Operations Research and Econometrics (CORE).
    5. Layte, Richard & Nolan, Anne, 2013. "Income-Related Inequity in the Use of GP Services: A Comparison of Ireland and Scotland," Papers WP454, Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI).
    6. Monika Sander, 2008. "Is There Migration-Related Inequity in Access to or in the Utilisation of Health Care in Germany?," SOEPpapers on Multidisciplinary Panel Data Research 147, DIW Berlin, The German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP).
    7. Hugh Gravelle & Stephen Morris & Matt Sutton, 2006. "Are General Practitioners Good for Endogenous Supply and Health," Working Papers 020cherp, Centre for Health Economics, University of York.
    8. Samuel L Brilleman & Hugh Gravelle & Sandra Hollinghurst & Sarah Purdy & Chris Salisbury & Frank Windmeijer, 2011. "Keep it Simple? Predicting Primary Health Care Costs with Measures of Morbidity and Multimorbidity," Working Papers 072cherp, Centre for Health Economics, University of York.
    9. Hugh Gravelle, 2003. "Measuring income related inequality in health: standardisation and the partial concentration index," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 12(10), pages 803-819.

    Lists

    This item is not listed on Wikipedia, on a reading list or among the top items on IDEAS.

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:wly:hlthec:v:11:y:2002:i:6:p:537-549

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: (Wiley-Blackwell Digital Licensing) or (Christopher F. Baum).

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If references are entirely missing, you can add them using this form.

    If the full references list an item that is present in RePEc, but the system did not link to it, you can help with this form.

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.