IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/mcm/sedapp/190.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Health-Care Utilization in Canada: 25 Years of Evidence

Author

Listed:
  • Lori J. Curtis
  • William J. MacMinn

Abstract

An abundance of literature links socio-economic status to health and health care in Canada and other countries. Recent anecdotal evidence indicates that Canadians believe their access to health care is diminishing over time. This study provides a brief description of utilization patterns in health-care services provided under public health insurance (physicians, specialists and hospitals) in Canada between 1978 and 2003. The relationships between socio-economic status (SES) and utilization, controlling for demographic characteristics are examined to investigate whether changes in the equity of utilization have occurred over time. Results indicate that SES inequities in utilization are apparent in publicly insured services, appearing to be more relevant in initial contact with the system rather than in the number of visits. Specialist’s services are particularly problematic and becoming more so over time.

Suggested Citation

  • Lori J. Curtis & William J. MacMinn, 2007. "Health-Care Utilization in Canada: 25 Years of Evidence," Social and Economic Dimensions of an Aging Population Research Papers 190, McMaster University.
    • Handle: RePEc:mcm:sedapp:190
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://socserv.mcmaster.ca/sedap/p/sedap190.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Chiappori, Pierre-Andre & Durand, Franck & Geoffard, Pierre-Yves, 1998. "Moral hazard and the demand for physician services: First lessons from a French natural experiment," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 42(3-5), pages 499-511, May.
    2. Mark Stabile, 2001. "Private insurance subsidies and public health care markets: evidence from Canada," Canadian Journal of Economics, Canadian Economics Association, vol. 34(4), pages 921-942, November.
    3. Curtis, Lori & Phipps, Shelley, 2004. "Social transfers and the health status of mothers in Norway and Canada," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 58(12), pages 2499-2507, June.
    4. Dunlop, Sheryl & Coyte, Peter C. & McIsaac, Warren, 2000. "Socio-economic status and the utilisation of physicians' services: results from the Canadian National Population Health Survey," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 51(1), pages 123-133, July.
    5. Rainer Winkelmann, 2002. "Health Care Reform and the Number of Doctor Visits � An Econometric Analysis," SOI - Working Papers 0210, Socioeconomic Institute - University of Zurich.
    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


    Cited by:

    1. Sara Allin & Jeremiah Hurley, 2009. "Inequity in publicly funded physician care: what is the role of private prescription drug insurance?," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 18(10), pages 1218-1232, October.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Lori J. Curtis & William J. MacMinn, 2008. "Health Care Utilization in Canada: Twenty-five Years of Evidence," Canadian Public Policy, University of Toronto Press, vol. 34(1), pages 65-88, March.
    2. Bolhaar, Jonneke & Lindeboom, Maarten & van der Klaauw, Bas, 2012. "A dynamic analysis of the demand for health insurance and health care," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 56(4), pages 669-690.
    3. Michael Gerfin & Martin Schellhorn, 2006. "Nonparametric bounds on the effect of deductibles in health care insurance on doctor visits – Swiss evidence," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 15(9), pages 1011-1020, September.
    4. Astrid Kiil, 2012. "Does employment-based private health insurance increase the use of covered health care services? A matching estimator approach," International Journal of Health Economics and Management, Springer, vol. 12(1), pages 1-38, March.
    5. Astrid Kiil & Jacob Nielsen Arendt, 2017. "The effect of complementary private health insurance on the use of health care services," International Journal of Health Economics and Management, Springer, vol. 17(1), pages 1-27, March.
    6. Hyojoung Kim & Doyoung Kim & Subin Im & James W. Hardin, 2009. "Evidence of Asymmetric Information in the Automobile Insurance Market: Dichotomous Versus Multinomial Measurement of Insurance Coverage," Journal of Risk & Insurance, The American Risk and Insurance Association, vol. 76(2), pages 343-366, June.
    7. Hoeck, Sarah & François, Guido & Van der Heyden, Johan & Geerts, Joanna & Van Hal, Guido, 2011. "Healthcare utilisation among the Belgian elderly in relation to their socio-economic status," Health Policy, Elsevier, vol. 99(2), pages 174-182, February.
    8. Bettina Isengard & Thorsten Schneider, 2006. "The euro and its perception in the German population," Discussion Papers 011, Europa-Universität Flensburg, International Institute of Management.
    9. Trottmann, Maria & Zweifel, Peter & Beck, Konstantin, 2012. "Supply-side and demand-side cost sharing in deregulated social health insurance: Which is more effective?," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 31(1), pages 231-242.
    10. Huck, Steffen & Lünser, Gabriele & Spitzer, Florian & Tyran, Jean-Robert, 2016. "Medical insurance and free choice of physician shape patient overtreatment: A laboratory experiment," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 131(PB), pages 78-105.
    11. Laurent Caussat & Denis Raynaud, 2004. "La régulation de la demande de soins : le rôle de l’assurance maladie dans la formation de la consommation de biens et services de santé," Revue d'Économie Financière, Programme National Persée, vol. 76(3), pages 129-151.
    12. Reichmann, Gerhard & Sommersguter-Reichmann, Margit, 2004. "Co-payments in the Austrian social health insurance system: Analysing patient behaviour and patients' views on the effects of co-payments," Health Policy, Elsevier, vol. 67(1), pages 75-91, January.
    13. Minke Remmerswaal & Jan Boone & Rudy Douven, 2019. "Selection and moral hazard effects in healthcare," CPB Discussion Paper 393.rdf, CPB Netherlands Bureau for Economic Policy Analysis.
    14. Thomas C. Buchmueller & Agnès Couffinhal & Michel Grignon & Marc Perronnin, 2004. "Access to physician services: does supplemental insurance matter? Evidence from France," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 13(7), pages 669-687, July.
    15. He, Juan & Zheng, Xiaoyong & Rejesus, Roderick & Yorobe, Jose Jr, 2016. "Estimating the Effect of Crop Insurance on Input Use When Insured Farmers are Monitored," 2016 Annual Meeting, July 31-August 2, Boston, Massachusetts 235225, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    16. Luc Clair, 2022. "Nonparametric Instrumental Variable Estimation using Complex Survey Data," Departmental Working Papers 2022-01, The University of Winnipeg, Department of Economics.
    17. Michael Smart & Mark Stabile, 2005. "Tax credits, insurance, and the use of medical care," Canadian Journal of Economics, Canadian Economics Association, vol. 38(2), pages 345-365, May.
    18. Pierre-Yves Geoffard, 2012. "Incentive and Selection Effects in Health Insurance," Chapters, in: Andrew M. Jones (ed.), The Elgar Companion to Health Economics, Second Edition, chapter 10, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    19. Prasanna Gai & Ashley Taylor, 2004. "International Financial Rescues and Debtor‐Country Moral Hazard," International Finance, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 7(3), pages 391-420, December.
    20. Ziad R. Ghandour, 2019. "Public-Private Competition in Regulated Markets," NIPE Working Papers 02/2019, NIPE - Universidade do Minho.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    health-care utilization; socio-economic status; Canada;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • I10 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - General
    • I11 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Analysis of Health Care Markets
    • I18 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Government Policy; Regulation; Public Health

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:mcm:sedapp:190. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    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 CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc 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 RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/demcmca.html .

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

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.