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Balance Billing For Inpatient Under National Health Insurance¡ÐAn Example of Regional Hospitals in Kaohsiung-Pingtung Area

Abstract
After the National Health Insurance was implemented ,it provides our citizens not only the basic medical treatment but also reduce the financial burden. However, the financial difficulties is becoming worse for National Health Insurance of Taiwan. In order to reduce the medical expenses.
The Health Insurance authorities implemented many different policies.Balance
billing was one of these interventions.
The purposes of this research included to understand the relationships between the balance
billing and the characteristics of physicians and
patients .Particularly, this research focused on
the perceptions of balance billing form the
Physicians and hospitalized patients¡¦points of
view. The Andersen¡¦s health behavior model was
the conceptual framework for this study. The questionnaire was sent out to 200 doctors and
1000 patients in Kaohsiung , Pingtung regional hospitals ,with 101 (response rate 50.6%)
and 638 (63.8%)returned , respectively. The characteristic and the attitude towards balance
billing system such as medical quality, medical care and medical expenses from both physicians and patients were collected. Descriptive analysis and logistic regression were used to analyze this study.
The Results from physicians survey are summarized as follows:
1.There were no statistical significance between
the physicians¡¦ characteristics (such as age,
gender, and tenure) and the agreement of
balance billing .Ninety-four out of 101
physicians agreed on the new policy.
2.There would be no influence of balance
billingon the medical care from the perspective
of physicians.
3.Physicians who agreed on the viewpoints of
paying extra payments would lead to the better
treatment were 12 times more likely to accept
the balance billing.
4.There were no difference among medical
expenditures, the level of understanding,
and the policy of balance billing.
The results from inpatient survey are summarized as follows:
1. Inpatients demographic characteristics, (such
as education¡Boccupation and disease),
were significant related to the agreement of
the policy of balance billing system.
However, there were no statistical difference
in age, gender, language, and private
insurance.
2.Most inpatients who agreed on the balance
billing policy were 1.8 times more to believe
that if they paid out-of-pocket, they would
gain more medical attention form physicians.
3.Regarding the quality of care, inpatients
whoever agreed upon the policy of balance
billing would perceive that they would receive
3 to 3.8 times higher quality of care in medical
materials and medicine, respectively.
4.The more the agreement of the balance billing
policy, the higher the satisfactory.
5.Inpatients who understood the new policy were
more likely to pay extra payment.
Based on the results from this study, it is certain to conclude that both the doctors and
inpatient of the region hospital are supporting
the balance billing policy .The average score of
the inpatient questionnaire is 3.305.And 93.1% of the surveyed. Doctors accepted the policy of
balance billing. We encouraged the bureau of
National Health Insurance to continuing
communication with the public and the providers
to assure the success of new policy.

Identiferoai:union.ndltd.org:NSYSU/oai:NSYSU:etd-0826103-153008
Date26 August 2003
CreatorsHan, Tsung-Chih
ContributorsJin-Yuan Chern, Jen-Her Wu, Shu-Chuan Jennifer Yeh, Shyh-Jer Chen
PublisherNSYSU
Source SetsNSYSU Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Archive
LanguageCholon
Detected LanguageEnglish
Typetext
Formatapplication/pdf
Sourcehttp://etd.lib.nsysu.edu.tw/ETD-db/ETD-search/view_etd?URN=etd-0826103-153008
Rightsunrestricted, Copyright information available at source archive

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